The importance of small details

In nature everyone matters. It doesn’t matter if you are a little ladybird or a big donkey,
a nice nightingale or an annoying mosquito… you will always be important because many others need you (just like you need others). This is how things work in nature, everyone is important because they have their role and when some of them are lost things start to get worse.

Unfortunately, most of the time due to ignorance, our lifestyle and our daily actions negatively affect nature, causing some of its parts to be lost (natural areas, living beings, resources). By analyzing and reflecting on our daily habits and the consequences they may have on nature, we will be able to identify the ones we need to change. Many people making small changes in their lives has the power to change the world.

Cycle:

• 2-6 years.

Duration:

• 2 sessions.

Material:

• Story “The natural garden”, by Pedro Pablo Sacristán (click here).

Goals:

• Awaken attitudes of care and respect towards nature.
• Learn to value all people equally.

Development:

In this activity we will read a beautiful and short story to internalize the reality that “in nature we are all important”, necessary to begin to respect and protect all forms of life. Later we will analyze our daily habits and reflect on the possible impacts they may have on other living beings. To finish the activity we will go out to observe the beautiful things that surround us and we will try to find out thanks to whom they exist.

Session I

We will begin this session with the reading of the story (click here). After sharing our feelings, we will all create a list of our most common daily habits (eating breakfast, brushing our teeth, going to school, being at school, having lunch,…) and we will reflect on how we do it and if we could change something to be kinder to nature. Examples:

If we brush our teeth leaving the tap running all the time, there will be less water in rivers and swamps and this can affect fish and frogs; if we only open the tap at the beginning and at the end, we will be using less water and the fish and frogs will be happier.

If we travel to school by car even if it is close, we make the air more dirty and we ourselves, the animals and the plants will breathe dirtier air; If we go to school on foot, by bike or by public transport, we will not pollute the air and we will all be able to breathe better.

Session II

In the first half of this session we will go out to the playground, the orchard and/or a nearby natural area and we will say what things we see seem most beautiful or interesting to us. After identifying them, we will try to answer the question of thanks to whom or to what is it possible? We will do the same with the observed things that we like less.

Once in class, we will reflect on the large number of relationships that exist in nature and how any change in one of its elements can affect many others. In this reflection, the human being should be introduced as one more element of nature and address the consequences of his actions on other animals, plants or environments.