How to introduce ocean conservation to children

It can be difficult sometimes knowing where to start with important topics, so our ‘how to’ series begins with ‘how to introduce ocean conservation to children’. Children are naturally curious and find the natural world fascinating, the more they learn the more they want to know, so introducing new topics and getting children engaged in real world issues is so important. But we also want to make it fun and accessible. Children are natural born problem solvers, they love thinking up new ideas and once we get them engaged, they’ll come up with wonderful ideas and thoughts. Here are our top tips in engaging children in the topic of ocean conservation:

• Read ‘Oceans Away’ with them – our ocean story tackles the theme of waste in our natural environment through beautiful illustrations and lyrical storytelling, introducing children to ocean creatures and the world under the waves, through the lens of the creatures who live there. We introduce plastic pollution as a theme to open up those conversations around conservation and what that means. (Our book is available in libraries in Wiltshire and Gloucestershire as part of our donations through our ‘books for libraries’ campaign, if you would like to borrow them elsewhere please ask your library to get in touch as we’re aiming on getting the books to libraries across the country).
• Discuss the different types of waste that end up in the ocean – from plastic bottles, bags and fishing nets, to sewage and chemicals, clothing to furniture, there is a lot of waste which we might not be aware of. Talk about how it might end up there and where it could come from.
• Share ideas about how we can all tackle this – maybe come up with some lists of actions that could prevent this, is there anything that you could implement at home?
• Organise a litter pick – this could be at the beach or more local if you’re not near a beach. You could list or log all of the items you find and start thinking about the types of waste found and how it could be dealt with.
• Make it fun! My favourite tip – we can make learning about important topics really fun, so download our free ocean finger puppets and get the children creating their own stories about the ocean and the waste we find there. They could take this even further by writing or drawing their own stories. There are story writing templates, a storytelling pack and a maths pack plus other fun downloads on our ‘Oceans Away’ page – scroll down to the bottom of the page to find them all.

Designed to get you started, this is a quick and simple ‘how to’ guide, we’d love to hear how you get on and where you take the topic from here, so get in touch to let us know.