Small steps make eco kids

How do you turn your kids into eco kids? Read on!

It’s sometimes so hard to do the right thing. There’s always something that goes wrong in my ‘wanna live a sustainable life’ quest. One of my major efforts is to teach my kids about the environment. First thing to do is to show them the beauty of our earth – that sounds cheesy, but it’s so true!

Photo credit: Becs Viveash

Here are some great ways to teach your kids about the beauty of nature, especially living in this beautiful tropical country of Malaysia… there’s no better place to do this. Here’s to turning them into eco kids!

• Take the kids out! Go biking, bird spotting in FRIM, to the park or visit a botanical garden.
• Bring nature inside. My daughter keeps on bringing seeds, leaves, stones, twigs, feathers and even bugs (yep, alive) inside. In the beginning I made her take all the stuff back outside immediately – “yuk”. But then I realised, that I don’t want her to think this ‘nature’ is dirt. So we kind of let her collect all her ‘nature treasures’ in a nice self-made box. Well, actually now they are spread all over the house and I’m the one tidying them up once in a while… We even have a swimming bug in an old aquarium. She named him Tintin (??)…
• Go and see animals nearby in the zoo, Farm in the City, Deer Park, Bird Park, Butterfly Park or even a bit further to see the fireflies or release baby turtles at the turtle sanctuary in Cherating. There are even cat cafés and places to hug bunnies in KL.
• There might be days when you don’t feel like going out. When the lego-time is over, there are a few nice ways to get your kids inspired by nature. Toca Nature is a beautifully designed app where the child can design habitats for animals, different landscapes, feed the animals – create a world! Another great app is the WWF Explore. They also have a fun website called GoWild, where kids can learn about continents by reading stories, playing games and making crafts.
• National Geographic Young Explorers has some issues that you can read online.
• You can become a member of the Malaysian Nature Society and join organised nature activities.

Eco kids workshop

If you want more inspiration, you can do an online family workshop called ‘Backyard Science Investigations‘!!

I’m pretty sure that my first step to a more sustainable life by showing my kids the beauty of our earth, is a good one. So lucky to live in Malaysia! Let’s keep going!