How to Use Sustainability as a Child Learning Tool
Last Updated: Apr 13, 2025Want to get a little out of your comfort zone? Want a little wow moment with your kiddos? On a hot summer day, take your kids to the dump. Yep, your local landfill. Let them see the plastic mashed into the earth. Let them smell what your city ate for dinner last week. Let them take that in for 30 minutes or so. If you're a hardcore lesson master, have a picnic there. Ask them questions and get a reaction.
Does this seem a bit silly? Ready for some eye rolls when you tell your friends and family? This is what your comfort zone feels like when you click the "away" button. Here's the thing about learning - it happens best when we are experiencing the world around us. A trip to the dump is a great trigger to a teachable moment, a moment that will be remembered. Life experience is the great leveler. You can use this moment to start a lifelong conversation with your kids about consumption, energy, and the environment.
Table of Contents
- The Impact of Teaching Sustainability
- H.O.U.S.E
- Get Your Kids Involved in Energy Efficiency – It Could Pay Off!
- Benefits of Creating a Sustainable Home for Your Children
- Mental Health
The Impact of Teaching Sustainability
What bigger long-term impact on the planet can you have than to raise energy-efficient children? Not everyone can be a superhero like Elon Musk. Think of the generational growth you can kick-start just by sharing (or tweaking) your daily practices and instilling the importance of those to your children. These little teachings become part of the fabric your children use to navigate the world.
Perhaps you, like many, were scolded for leaving lights on or running electronics too much. But, were you also taught about the environmental impact? Or, was only the mystical power bill mentioned? Maybe you would have been keener to conserve energy and would have developed an early and life long interest in efficiency! So, let's instill this passion in our kids now, and watch the impact grow in many parts of their lives - an inspiring goal.
As many parents know, the trick for communicating with young kids is to frame the conversation in ways that they can understand. Let them know that the everyday actions they take within their house have an impact outside the home. Don't scare them, don't overdo it. You can begin by connecting the dots with a few critical hot spots.
To put this conversation into terms that are easy to remember, we've created a fun acronym called H.O.U.S.E. Put this to use as a talking tool with your children. As an example, let's try it out at bath time.
Benefits of Creating a Sustainable Home for Your Children
Self Confidence
Giving children control over their decisions builds self-confidence. Children who take part and have a say in the family's goal (and are trusted with a task), feel like they're part of the team. This team atmosphere leads to a happier environment for all. You can imagine the feeling of inclusion created when an entire family tackles a problem together as a single unit.
Empathy
Similar to getting a pet, teaching children about sustainability and the environment builds empathy for nature. This will help ensure your child grows up to care for others on a level you would hope for.
Learning
- Recycling
- Turning down the heat when not in use
- Avoiding one-time-use plastic bottles
- Picking up garbage
- Taking part in a worthwhile protest
- Using a low-flow toilet
All of these are touchpoints to the world for your children and offer a learning opportunity. Your sustainable journey offers all of these ready-made discussions to help your child understand the world's inner workings.
Future
You are exposing your children to cleantech trends that simply won't go away. Early adoption of this line of thinking, along with real-life experience within it, will open wider doors for your child as they embark on their career paths.
It can all start with a trip to the dump.
Rise
At Rise, we strive to make sustainable home improvement easy and accessible for everyone. Whether you're building or renovating, our thoroughly vetted building products will help you reduce your carbon footprint, lower energy costs, and create a more sustainable living or working environment.
