We are excited to share that our Trash Hero kids’ book is now available in an 8th language: Arabic!
Huge thanks to the Trash Hero Kuwait volunteers who helped to translate and do the layout and to Al-Sayer Group who sponsored the printing. The book and activity programme will now be available to 1,000 children for free, bringing the Trash Hero message to a new generation in Kuwait.
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Three pilot classes have been implemented as part of the Trash Hero Kids’ Programme in Switzerland, with the aim of raising environmental awareness among children from 1st to 3rd grade and teaching them how to live sustainably and reduce plastic in their everyday life.
As part of the Programme we developed a book which tells the story of a fictional character who helps to reduce plastic waste, so that the animals and nature around them are not harmed. The book shows, in a simple and child-friendly way, the impact of plastic waste pollution on the environment and teaches that each individual can make a change every day and become a Trash Hero themselves.
In Bratsch in the canton of Valais, our book was read as a group in the morning circle over a period of several months. When doing handicrafts, more attention was paid to using recycled materials and creating something new from old things. In addition, focus weeks were held in various subjects. The content of the programme is in line with Curriculum 21 and the Kid’s Book is suitable for art, German maths, as well as for sports and music classes. A pogramme highlight was the Cleanup, with the whole school taking part across four villages. Divided into four groups, several full bags of trash were collected and then disposed of by the community.
The school concluded: “Thank you very much for letting us be part of the Trash Hero project. We will continue with it this school year and will take a deeper look at earthworm composting. The Trash Hero Kid’s Book is appropriate for children and sustainable for learning. We spend a lot of time outdoors and because of the story, it’s much easier to talk to kids about trash in nature.”
For more information on the Trash Hero Kid’s Book go to: https://trashhero.org/trash-hero-kids-book/
Want to implement the Trash Hero Kids Programme in your school? Contact us at: kids@trashhero.org
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The Trash Hero kids’ story and activity book has been translated into a sixth language – Malaysian!
With the help of Trash Hero Malaysia volunteers, 1000 children on both Borneo and the mainland will soon get the chance to be heroes through our hands-on learning programme.
17,830 copies of the book have been printed since its launch in 2018. It is currently available in English, Thai, Indonesian, Malay, Burmese, Czech and German.
We are grateful to our local sponsors in Langkawi:
– Pelangi Beach Resort & Spa
– The Westin Langkawi Resort & Spa
– Umgawa Legendary Adventures
– Langkawi Christmas Bazaar
who covered the cost of the Malaysian print run.
You can find more resources for kids in the dedicated section on our website.
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If Trash Heroes are certain of one thing, it’s that change happens when we band together!
The Trash Hero Kids Movement is going strong in Koh Yao Noi, Thailand, where kids at local schools are taking action to save the world and learn how to live more sustainably.
The excitement grew even stronger this month thanks to Six Senses Resort, which bought new reusable Trash Hero Water Bottles for all the kids on the island! The resort also installed water filtration systems in every school on Koh Yao Noi.
Making the switch from single-use plastics to reusable alternatives is critically important to the global fight against pollution. By teaching kids this importance, Trash Hero is actively working toward a sustainable future – and building the leaders of tomorrow!
Of the 20,000 plastic drink bottles purchased globally every second, it’s estimated that 19,000 are destined for a landfill at best – or otherwise likely to wind up in the sea. By using a reusable bottle, we can each save hundreds of plastic bottles every year from this fate!
To learn more about how to get your own Trash Hero Water Bottle and our participating partners, please visit our Bottle Refill Program page.
To join the Trash Hero Kids Movement, check out https://trashhero.org/kids/
Thanks again to Six Senses Yao Noi! If you’d like to support sustainability and the Trash Hero movement in your community, get in touch!
Fourth grader Henry Adelson is a volunteer with Trash Hero New York. This year, he hopes his fellow classmates will join him in cleaning up the Hudson River.
My name is Henry Adelson, and I am 9 years old and going into the fourth grade. I live in New York City and go to the Ethical Culture Fieldston School, which is a few blocks from the Hudson River. Thank you for letting me share how I got involved in volunteering with an organization called Trash Hero and my plan to help them clean up New York City.
When I was in the third grade, my dad introduced me to his friend Denise Rehrig. Denise and her husband are the founders of Trash Hero New York. They learned about Trash Hero in Asia while they were traveling the world, and I learned about it from them. Trash Hero tries to keep trash from going into the water where it can be very bad for the environment. They liked it so much they asked if they could start Trash Hero in NYC.
Volunteers meet at the Hudson River a few blocks from my school once a month. I volunteered and picked up garbage along the Hudson with about 50 others just before summer vacation. We all did this to keep garbage from going into the Hudson. I was at camp this summer so couldn’t volunteer, but I’ll be back in September — and I’m bringing friends!
Trash Hero New York mobilizes volunteers to take action to keep their community, including its waterways, clean
Trash Hero is important to me for many reasons. When I was in the third grade, I studied all about the Hudson River and how the native Americans relied on the Hudson for their food and drinking water. My science teacher Barbara rents out an oyster trap in the river for the third grade, and we study all about these oysters and the importance of clean water. When I volunteered with Trash Hero, I could see our class’s oyster trap, so I was helping our oysters.
We learned that when Henry Hudson (who the Hudson River is named after) landed in New York there were so many oysters in the river, but now there are much fewer. The work Trash Hero is doing will help them come back. The more people who help keep the river clean, the better it will be for the millions of people who live near the river. It’s my dream that one day that if we all pitch in to keep the Hudson clean, we’ll be able to swim, fish, and do all sorts of other activities in and around the river.
Henry with a friend at the Trash Hero New York cleanup in September
Trash Hero can help my dream come true. I plan on helping Trash Hero by:
1) volunteering on cleanup days every time I get the chance,
2) asking friends to pitch in and join me,
3) asking my principal Rob if I can hang up posters with Trash Hero volunteer schedules,
4) once school starts in September, by telling our third grade science teacher Barbara about Trash Hero since it is helping our oysters.
Thank you again for letting me tell my story about Trash Hero as part of the Renewal Project, and thanks to the guys at Next Gen Summit for telling me and my dad about it.
Henry Adelson, August 2018
….
Following this lovely story, Roman Peter, co-founder of Trash Hero World, sent Henry one of our kids’ books, and earlier this month he received a reply:
We love you too, Henry, and Trash Hero kids the world over, who are inspiring us all to take action for a cleaner world.
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[Article by Petra, Trash Hero Freiburg]
Now they are finally here: thanks to a donation from Freiburg Cleanup Week, around 1,500 new children’s books were made available to our Trash Hero Indonesia chapters at the Family Meeting at the beginning of November in Bali!
The Freiburg Cleanup Week is an initiative of the Wirtschaftsjunioren Freiburg [Junior Chamber of Commerce, Freiburg]. During the various events of that week in July 2018, donations were collected from local Freiburg companies, and forwarded to 3 selected organisations. And Trash Hero World was one of them!
“Trash Hero’s Kids’ program won us over with its forward-looking focus on children and the positive approach to long-term behaviour change. In addition, with the support of the Trash Hero Kids’ book program in Southeast Asia, we would like to express that the city of Freiburg is also assuming international responsibility for the problem of plastic waste.” So explains project manager, Jana Weitze, of the Junior Chamber of Commerce in Freiburg.
Trash Hero Indonesia says: “terima kasih, Freiburg!”
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Over the past three weeks, more than a hundred of our amazing local leaders across Southeast Asia came together in their countries for a series of summits, that we call “family meetings”, due to the incredible spirit and emotional connections that they foster.
Exchanging news, knowledge and ideas, they left energised and excited to do even more in their communities to take action on waste.
We kicked off in Bangkok, Thailand, from 27 – 29 April; then moved on to Kuala Lumpur in Malaysia from 1 – 2 May; Bali, Indonesia from 4 – 6 May; and finally Yangon in Myanmar from 11 – 13 May.
Alongside presentations on Trash Hero’s progress, values and objectives, we enjoyed lively discussions on community waste banks; burning trash; water filters; and greenwashing.
And we were able to start the process of registration of legal entities to represent Trash Hero within each country – a step that will allow the movement to professionalise and scale under the governance of Trash Hero World.
The family meetings also provided the opportunity to launch and distribute our kids’ book and activity program, sponsored by last year’s crowdfunding campaign. The response from our chapters was overwhelming, with all 3000 books snapped up – and in some areas, such as Trash Hero Candidasa below, already in use!
Trash Hero Candidasa kids
One of the most impressive abilities of our Trash Hero leaders is their talent for collaborating and uniting an entire community against unnecessary waste, across cultures, languages, businesses, and a number of other interests. Last month, Trash Hero Koh Samui hosted a community-wide event to further network the organization alongside like-minded interests on the island and make way for an even more productive 2018.
Their goal is to bring community members together to educate all about recycling, waste-free living, and the dangers posed by trash. Full community involvement increases opportunities for effective clean-ups and fundraising to invest in initiatives like reusable bottles, bags, and water refill stations. Trash Hero Samui is also working to increase involvement of local students, including those from the International School of Samui (ISS), to empower them to assume leadership roles driving the cleaning and sustainability of their local communities.
In spite of inclement weather and heavy rains, more than 200 people joined to clean an area of Hua Thanon, including the Mayor of Koh Samui, representatives from major businesses and the Army, members of other local organizations like Samui Clean, and many Thai schools.
With your generous support, we have made it through the first stage of our project! Reaching the 8000 euro target means we can now CONFIRM that the Trash Hero Kids book will be printed, distributed and taught to kids in Thailand and Indonesia.
Now we aim to extend the project’s impact to include even more kids! Since starting the project, we have had interest from our teams in Myanmar and Malaysia to create local language versions of the project, as well as requests for more books in Thailand.
We still have a few more days to take this project even further. So let’s keep this momentum and continue to raise funds so your contribution has even more impact!
The Trash Hero Kids Book is a story and activity book with a powerful call to take action on plastic waste in the environment. Children will be inspired and challenged to change their behaviour, and receive incentives like the coveted Trash Hero T-shirt as a reward.
The book and shirt package will be distributed free to children in Southeast Asia, where plastic pollution is reaching critical proportions. Awareness of the issue in Southeast Asia remains low, and education is limited or not put into practice. Children are taught “don’t litter” at school, but don’t seem to make any connection between these words and their everyday habits. The real life consequences of plastic leakage are rarely explored; and there are no positive role models or clear paths to drive behaviour change.
The labour and skills overheads for this project – like all Trash Hero projects – is ZERO. Our dedicated volunteers have already prepared the book and its translations; and more volunteers in our local chapters stand ready to oversee the distribution and activities.
That means that every single Euro you donate will be spent on creating the physical products to put into the hands of children.
Contributions can be made at either of these sites:
https://www.100-days.net/…/projekt/trashhero-children-s-bookor https://www.paypal.me/TrashHeroWorld
Help us make our holiday dreams come true and reach even more kids!
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We have almost two thirds of our target funds to produce our #trashherokids book! Thank you to all who have donated so far. Not donated yet? Take that small step now: https://www.100-days.net/en/projekt/trashhero-children-s-book
Many people have commented on the beautiful illustrations in the book and indeed, we chose our artist for her evocative, sensitive treatment of the story, rather than the cartoon style so often seen in children’s environmental stories.
Here, we want to share with you Ewelina’s own story of how she came to the project.
*DREAMS COME TRUE*
“This project is very important to me, it’s very close to my heart, so I want to tell you the story how it all started for me. Maybe later you will become a part of the project too :).
I’m in love with nature, underwater life or forests are sacred for me. But these places are in danger.
Once I was swimming on the coral reefs and I saw an amazing, impressive giant blue starfish. I swam just a bit further and something blue took my attention again. I expected to see another beautiful animal, but what I found was just a blue plastic bag. Oh my, it was such a sad view. At moment like this you just want to cry. You are aware you are in such amazing world, but this world will disappear if we do not care enough.
After this experience I had a very specific dream – I dreamed about picking up trash in Bali!
In the beginning I felt little ashamed to tell it to anyone, my mom could have said “Hey kid, you should do bigger things than collecting trash!”. So I kept it secret for a while 😉
One year later I decided to move to Bali and it was the best time to realise the dream!
But of course I would feel awkward to do this alone. So I was ready to write an advertisement to find other crazy people to join me in this adventure. Then I found out about Trash Hero! First we were only three people, but after few months the group grew bigger, even kids from local schools were involved.
When I returned to Poland, a dear Balinese friend told me that Trash Hero World had the idea how to explain other kids why it’s important to take care of our world, and they looked for an illustrator. I applied for the contest. I wanted to take part in a project that is so close to my heart. I love this world and I want to make it better.
Together with Trash Hero we have prepared a wonderful, very inspiring book that stimulates the sensitivity of children to the surrounding world. I believe this book is giving important lessons of loving our planet and has to reach all children all over the globe, starting in Asia.”
Ewelina Wajgert is a Polish graphic artist, who graduated from the Academy of Fine Arts in Gdańsk. Follow Ewelina here: https://www.facebook.com/wajgert/
#togetherwemakeadifference
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