The Classroom Energy Diet Challenge, is the only energy literacy competition in Canada where students K-12 compete for more than 100 prizes worth a total $40,000. K-12 classrooms across Canada improve their energy awareness and energy literacy through a variety of energy related challenges. They’ll be competing for more than 100 prizes worth a total of $40,000!
Again this year, the students in Christina Van den Eynden’s class at East Lake School are thrilled to be participating in the Classroom Energy Diet Challenge.
But let’s start with what is the Classroom Energy Diet Challenge (CEDC). The Classroom Energy Diet Challenge is a competition among Canadian Kindergarten to Grade 12 classrooms that aims to increase energy awareness. Throughout the challenge period (February 1 – April 27, 2016), classrooms work together to complete 25 energy-themed challenges designed to teach students about different energy topics and increase their overall energy awareness. Each classroom can select the number of challenges to complete and the order to complete them in based on the needs of their classroom.
Ms. Van den Eynden’s class has participated in a number of challenges so far including:
‘A Green Powered Canada’ – where the students looked at the advantages and disadvantages of solar and wind power.
‘Do You Really Need It?’ – students discussed how often electronics are thrown away when a new one has come out. They used cell phones as an example and talked about how many different iPhones their parents have had since they were in kindergarten. The students totalled it up and in a class of 28 students their parents had had 196 different cell phones in 6 years. Most parents had gone through an average of 4 cell phones in 6 years.
‘Get Growing’ – had students researching photosynthesis and they created posters to show the process. They then planted their own seeds to watch them grow. The class now has some flowers, garlic, carrots, lettuce and peas.
‘How Big Are Your Carbon Feet?’ – the students started this challenge by watching a video on what is your carbon footprint. They then calculated the carbon footprint for an 11 year old boy in Kenya. Kids were super excited at this point and we’re ready to calculate their own carbon footprints. They were shocked how high they were compared to the boy. They talked about why it was so different and then everyone wrote a paragraph on why theirs was different and 4 ways they can fix their footprint. The most exciting part was one girl from my class last year had reduced her footprint by a lot from what it came out last year!!!
‘One Hour No Power’ – students turned the lights off and computers each morning for the first 2 hours of class. They read and worked on other school work during this time and went outside for science a couple of times. Students loved having the lights out and still ask to turn them out, even though this challenge is completed. Their assistant principal has also kept her lights off in her office since we started to support the students.
‘Track Your Trash’ – in this challenge, students were held accountable for the trash in their classroom and also implemented their own compost and recycling system in the class. The students that I spoke with about this also touched on the recycling and composting program that has been implemented in the City of Chestermere and all were in agreed that the blue and green bins are a wonderful idea and that they were all noticing a change in decrease of trash in their homes.
Proud teacher, Christina Van den Eynden, said, “This is my 5th year participating in The Energy Diet Challenge. I participate every year as well as try to get other classes to participate as I think it is so important to educate our children about environmental concerns that will be facing their generation. I find students really take the challenges to heart and try to make changes at home and in turn educate their parents. The Energy Diet is so makes the challenges engaging and fun yet educational. The great part is all the challenges fit into our curriculum whether it is science, social studies or language arts”.
“I have noticed a huge difference this year as last year we calculated our carbon footprint with my grade 5’s and 6’s and many students’ footprints were super high. They needed 8 earths to sustain their habits in their lifetime. This year I have 7 student in my class again and many of their earths when we calculated their carbon foot prints went down. Many students were now at 2 or 3 earths to sustain them. The big reason for it decreasing was one student said she now turns the lights off when she leaves a room, many unplug devices at home when not in use after learning about phantom power and the biggest is they all have reduced their garbage to one bag a week and are now composting at their houses”, explained Van den Eynden, “Each year students ask “When are we doing the Energy Diet Challenge”! I love how motivated they are to learn and change their habits at a young age”.
Another aspect of the Energy Diet Challenge is the students create art pieces out of recyclable materials. Again this year, starting next week, you can see the students beautiful pieces of art displayed at the Waiting Room Café.
