Awesome essays from 4th Graders

In Featured, General by David Sinclair

Food for Thought Ojai started with the mission to educate, support, and inspire healthier food choices for students and their families. Taking it a step further we espouse the belief that healthier food comes from a healthy planet and partner with teachers integrating environmental awareness lessons across their classroom curriculum. We also partner with Nutrition Services department to reduce the use of 5-compartment styrofoam trays during meal service. Our donations towards the purchase of compostable trays have totaled nearly $10,000 over the past 3 years.  We are proud to feature three essays from students in Ms. Dvortcsak’s 4th grade class at Topa Topa.  _______________________

Brody Dvortcsak

Doctors For Our Earth

      What of the Four Rs? Which do you think is the most important? How much trash is picked up every year in America? How much trash is in the ocean? I think people should reduce, reuse, recycle, and rot to help the Earth.

     I believe that everyone should recycle to help the Earth. Recycling makes old stuff into new stuff. 29% percent of stuff that can be recycled, gets thrown into the trash. Recycling aluminum can produces energy to run a T.V. for three hours! In 2010, using recycled paper has been increased by 89% since 1990.

     I think that everyone should reuse and reduce. Four billion trees are cut down for paper every year. Please use recycled paper products. Reusing your relatives cloths when they grow out of it helps the Earth. If people drink less soda from plastic soda cans, and instead drink from reusable cans, it would maybe help reduce trash in the landfills. Our country should start using reusable paper for all newspapers because a really high amount of trees are getting cut down for newspapers.

     Evidence shoes that composting make healthy soil and less trash in the landfills. You are going to need a box with holes in it and soil. Then, you need to put food scraps and other stuff in it with worms to help break down the waste.Things that you should never compost are meat, bones, and junk food. The percentage of people in America that don’t compost are seventy-two percent.

     I think that the all of the Rs are equally important for our Earth. Two hundred fifty-four million pounds of trash gets picked up every year by trash trucks. Eighteen trillion pounds of trash is in the ocean. I think people should reduce, reuse, recycle, and rot to help the Earth stay healthy. In my opinion, the 4Rs are like a doctor for our Earth.

_____________________ John Ruf   

Food For Our Earth                                      

                                                                 

How big is Trash Island? It’s two times the size of Texas, nine feet deep, and only growing. Trash Island is all plastic. Plastic is made of petroleum, a toxic substance that kills the animals that eat it. Paper isn’t better. Up to 7 million trees get cut down every year to make paper products.

I believe that recycling will help the Earth but we also have to reduce our consumption. Every time you throw away a plastic bottle that could’ve been recycled, you’re creating toxic fumes in the ground.Only 9% of plastic is recycled.  Why do we make so much trash? It’s not good for us, animals, or our Earth generally. We have to reduce, but that’s not all we can do to save the Earth.

I think recycling is also a big factor in saving our Earth. Two million plastic products are used every hour, and  91% of it isn’t recycled. Why do some of us make so much trash when others devote their lives to cleaning it up? If we all tried, we could save millions of trees by using recycled paper. It’s not hard to reuse, reduce, recycle — “The Three Rs.”!

Evidence shows that even if throwaway plastic is the easier path, reusable products are the better path. We have to start using reusable products. Every minute the equivalent of a garbage truck filled with plastic is dumped in our ocean. We make 1,000,000 plastic bottles a minute. If you opened a sea bird’s stomach, it would would be filled with plastic. Do we want that?  Of course we don’t want that!

Reusable products are the only plan left. In my eyes, The Three R’s are the medicine the Earth needs to heal!! “Don’t look to the past, but look to the future.”

_____________________ Teya

Love for the Earth 

                            

Have you heard about all the trash islands? Do you know how much trash is in our ocean? Do you know how to recycle? I think that recycling, rotting, reusing, and reducing is very important to our Earth.

I believe that recycling is important to the Earth. If you have a little brother or sister you can give them your old clothes or if they are older, they can give you their old clothes. To help the Earth, you can recycle cans, bottles, plastic, paper, and glass. You should recycle because if you don’t  paper and glass will end up in the landfill and never decompose. One hundred acres of  trees get cut down just for paper but if we recycle we won’t have to cut down as many trees.

I think that reusing, reducing, and recycling can help our Earth by keeping our trash levels down. When you reuse you can help not waste so much paper and plastic. Don’t buy plastic water bottles, but if you do  try to reuse as much as possible so we don’t waste plastic. If you buy a piece of paper to color on but you run out of room use the backside instead of getting a new piece of paper.

Evidence shows that when you compost you can make better soil for plants. Did you know you can compost bananas, apple cores, vegetables, and egg shells. Every single year, each American throws away 1,200 pounds of rot into the landfill. Compost is like feeding the earth food. Compost is saving old food and rot from being thrown away.

There are several Trash Islands in our oceans that collect thousands of pounds of trash.There are 5.25 trillions of trash in our oceans. You can recycle and reuse plastic water bottles and cans. I think that reusing, reducing, recycling, and rotting is important for our Earth. In my opinion the 4rs are like love for the Earth.