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GEF Activity: Trash to Gas Earth-Friendly Waste Management (Saving Our Living Earth): Charlotte Wilcox People are throwing away more than ever before. Everything is made to be disposable-from diapers to dishes to cameras. Collecting, hauling, sorting, processing, burning, and burying this unwanted stuff can be challenging. Too much trash is harmful to our health and to the environment. And unmanaged waste spreads pollution into our water, soil, and air. We can help make our planet healthier by reducing, reusing, recycling, and recovering waste in Earth-friendly ways. With engaging text and eye-catching images-plus a special Going Green section-this book tells you all about Earth-friendly waste management and what you can do to promote it. |
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GEF Activity: Trash to Gas How You Can Use Waste Energy to Heat and Light Your Home (Tell Your Parents): Claire O'Neal On average, each American throws away a staggering one ton of trash every year. Most of that trash will reach a dead end in a landfill, taking up space and polluting the earth. We can all make an effort to live a life less trashy by recycling, reusing, and being smart about what we buy. But what can we do with the trash we do make? Cities all over the world are making their trash work for them by turning it into energy. In waste-to-energy power plants, trash is burned in a controlled way to generate electricity while keeping it out of the landfill. Even landfilled trash can be used to generate energy, if we harness the gas released when garbage breaks down. Turning trash into energy is a practical way to help our landfills last longer and reduce our need for polluting energy from coal and oil. Tell your parents! |
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GEF Activity: How Solar Cells Work Solar Power: Tea Benduhn Packaged in a small, square format, this title presents a surprising amount of information about solar power in brief sentences that are calibrated to newly confident readers’ abilities. The short chapters start with essential definitions of terms such as solar system before moving into topics such as renewable energy and greenhouse gases. The selection of well-chosen color photos, which are crisply reproduced on each page, is particularly strong in final chapters about solar technology, and the close-up images of a solar-powered car and tent will attract young browsers. Readers will likely need help with advanced concepts, for example, global warming, which is illustrated with a helpful diagram, but the language is direct, clear, and enlightening. A short glossary, resource list, and index close this strong title in the Energy for Today series. |
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GEF Activity: Solar Lesson: What Time is it? Harnessing Power from the Sun (Energy Revolution): Niki Walker This amazing new book tells why solar power is becoming a very real replacement for our current energy sources, with detailed images featuring different types of solar collectors, solar thermal plants, and solar cells. |
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GEF Activity: How Wind Works Wind Power (Energy for Today): Tea Benduhn A waving flag, blowing leaves, a kite soaring through the sky all are moved by wind power. Wind is also our fast-growing source of energy. Find out how wind forms and the different ways we may use it in the future. |
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GEF Activity: Watershed Protection or Litter from Lunchtime Just a Dream: Chris Van Allsburg Young Walter is a careless boy who tosses rubbish on the grass, thinks recycling is a waste of time, and mocks his neighbor, Rose, for her delight in the tree she has just received on her birthday. But his dreams warn him of Earth's troubled future if he does not learn to care for the environment. |
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GEF Activity: Watershed Protection or Litter from Lunchtime Judy Moody Saves the World: Megan McDonald When Judy Moody's class studies the environment, Judy is startled to learn about the destruction of the rainforest, the endangered species (not) in her own backyard, and her own family's crummy recycling habits. Can she come up with a plan to save the world? |
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GEF Activity: Air Pollution Math The Fire Bug Connection: An Ecological Mystery: Jean Craighead George In this environmental whodunit, 12-year-old Maggie can't figure out why her exotic and beautiful new fire bugs are dying so suddenly. Is it climate change, acid rain, or murder? With the help a young computer whiz, Maggie tracks down each ecological clue. |
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GEF Activity: Watershed Protection or Litter from Lunchtime or Oil Spill Effects Tracking Trash: Flotsam, Jetsam and the Science of the Ocean Motion: Loree Griffin Burns Burns tells the tale of Dr. Curtis Ebbesmeyer, an oceanographer who started to track trash (flotsam) that washed up on the shore near his Seattle home. Through floating sneakers and bath toys that accidentally fell off container ships and a computer program named OSCURS, Ebbesmeyer tracked the currents of the ocean. These experiments led to a discussion of how debris is polluting our oceans and causing harm to marine life. Burns introduces the work of several scientists who are working to clean up ghost nets and other dangerous debris. The well-written narration will keep readers engaged, and it's excellent for reports. The science is clearly explained, and the vivid and lively photographs and well-labeled charts and diagrams help to create interest and build understanding. |
