Sometimes it’s hard to entice young readers, Orca Echoes is a series meant to introduce readers from ages 7-9 to the love of books!
Does your child love the environment? Pamela McDowell’s Salamander Rescue explores the further adventures of Cricket and her friends! Catch up with Cricket’s first installment in Ospreys in Danger.
Cricket McKay has lived in Waterton all her life, so she is surprised to discover an animal she hasn’t seen before: the long-toed salamander. She finds a band of them migrating from the pond to their hibernation grounds at Crandell Mountain. Crossing the road that lies between the pond and the mountain is dangerous enough, but now a newly-constructed curb makes their journey even more challenging. Can Cricket and her friends come up with a solution to help the salamanders?
Show your youngsters the importance of green living with Justine McKeen, the Queen of Green! Justine is back with Justine McKeen, Bottle Throttle, the seventh book in the Justine McKeen series by Sigmund Brouwer! This time Justine’s worried about what plastic is doing to the environment and to her classmates, so she sets out to ban bottled water school-wide. The only problem is, the new principal, Dr. Proctor, isn’t on board. Justine will have to convince him and persuade her classmates if Project Bottle Throttle is going to succeed!
This summer, be like Justine McKeen and challenge yourself to green living with these 10 ways to reduce your footprint:
- Bring reusable bags and containers when shopping, traveling, or packing lunches or leftovers.
- Choose products that are returnable, reusable, or refillable over single-use items.
- Avoid individually wrapped items, snack packs, and single-serve containers. Buy large containers of items or from bulk bins whenever practical.
- Be aware of double-packaging – some “bulk packages” are just individually wrapped items packaged yet again and sold as a bulk item.
- Purchase items such as dish soap and laundry detergents in concentrate forms.
- Compost food scraps and yard waste. Many types of food scraps, along with leaves and yard trimmings, can be combined in your backyard compost bin.
- Reduce the amount of unwanted mail you receive. The average resident in America receives over 30 pounds of junk mail per year.
- Shop at second-hand stores. You can find great used and unused clothes at low cost to you and the environment. Buy quality clothing that won’t wear out and can be handed down, whether to other people you know or on to a thrift store.
- Buy items made of recycled content, and use and reuse them as much as you can. For instance, use both sides of every page of a notebook before moving on to the next clean notebook. Use unneeded, printed on printer paper for a scratch pad.
- Make sure you turn off lights and electronics when they’re not needed!