The Milky Way class was curious how other countries manage their garbage or how they recycle. We watched some videos to answer the questions in our minds. They chose to watch Taiwan and Sweden and we discovered some similarities to how Japan manages their garbage. We found out that Sweden recycles all their garbage and they also buy or accept garbage from other countries. They have sorting stations everywhere and they recycle them as many times as they can and become a source of  income to many people. They also convert non-recyclable waste into usable forms of energy including heat, fuels and electricity. Taiwan has rules and regulations on how to manage their garbage like the pay as you throw scheme. They also removed almost all of their public bins and replaced them with regularly scheduled garbage trucks. They also introduced i-trash stations wherein people can throw their garbage in the vending machines but if you throw general garbage and kitchen waste you will be charged and if you throw recyclable materials you will be paid by the machine. In Japan, there are recycling stations outside the supermarkets wherein people can bring their recyclable materials in the facility and get some points after using it.

We also played a game called “This or That” to identify which action is good for the environment and which is applying the 3 R’s. Most of the students shared their ideas why they chose that particular action. “If we use a plastic bag in shopping, we can use it again but when it’s broken we will have lots of trash. We can just put it in mom’s bag if we don’t have an eco bag.” “People didn’t follow the rules in throwing the garbage. It says recycle bin, but they mixed up all the trash.” Milky Way also thought of the symbols appropriate for reduce, reuse, and recycle. The arrows were given to each group and thought on how to show the meaning of the 3 R’s with the arrows.

Three students shared how they applied 3 R’s outside the school. One of them collected their recycling papers and brought them to the community recycling station. The other one donated their old books to school and everybody enjoys reading them. Thank you for donating! And another student helped in taking their plastic garbage to the garbage collection station on the scheduled date at their place. Great job, everyone! Let’s continue to apply the 3 R’s to help the community and the environment!

Thank you for reading and have a nice weekend! See you next week!