SPARE program in the Bryansk Gymnasium: campaign "Save our water body!"

Authors:

Valentina Yakushenko, Headmaster of "Gymnasium No. 1 of the Bryansk District".

Natalia Zaytseva, Head of the Environmental Center "Agroecology"

 "Gymnasium No. 1 of the Bryansk District".

Translator: Marina Shelkunova,

English teacher , " Gymnasium No 1 of Bryansk District"

Since 2010, within the framework of environmental education, "Gymnasium No. 1 of the Bryansk District," has been actively developing the SPARE program. In 2019 the ecological center "Agroecology» based at the “Gymnasium No. 1 of the Bryansk District” started working. One of the directions of the center's work is the creation of a school climate plan, training students in waste management, and saving of water resources. In the context of a pandemic COVID-19, all opportunities to raise and strengthen their immunity become very relevant. The use of air-water baths by schoolchildren near a natural water body in summer raises the mood and immunity of each student. However, for this, the shores and reservoirs should be kept in a pristine cleanliness. Only in this case all teachers and schoolchildren will be able to meet the beauty and uniqueness of the local nature, which will make them appreciate, wonder, rejoice and admire each object.

The infant abilities to see and hear nature arise a deep interest in students expand their knowledge and contribute to the formation of an inquisitive character and interests. The foundations of such knowledge come primarily in the family, and then, in educational institutions.

That is why in June 2020 the teachers of our Gymnasium in the partnership with the scientists of the Bryansk NGO "Viola" created a new brochure for summer excursions to water bodies.

These guidelines: "Let's keep the water bodies of our Homeland clean" are created for the teachers working with children of 6-16 years old in school summer camps. The work was carried out as part of our many years of working in the SPARE program. We offer adults and students texts of six classes, workshops, tours to local water bodies with an analysis of the level of water pollution and the coastal zone.

In our classes, schoolchildren will be able to conduct monitoring of water and coastal territory, identify the main pollutants, help in strengthening the coast, and learn how to behave properly near water bodies.

These short research tours let the schoolchildren and their parents see how to collect coastal and water garbage correctly, how to analyze the sources and distribution by type in river basins. Some classes will be devoted to the study of different types of plastic garbage, its impact on the life of aquatic animals. Students will receive some basic knowledge about the dangers of garbage in aquatic ecosystems.

In classes, sitting on the banks of a river, a lake, near a spring, schoolchildren will remember some native poems, songs, proverbs how our ancestors saved water from pollution. They will discuss how a huge number of single-use plastic things entered our daily lives and how real it is to stop it right now.

Schoolchildren will create individual school plans of action to clean water bodies and coastal areas from garbage. There will be an opportunity to introduce the proposals of the Gymnasium to the local government. Active groups will create some recommendations for schoolchildren how to expand the activities of the SPARE program in the aspects of reusing items and reduce their own environmental footprint.

We e-mail our new brochure «Let's keep the water bodies of our Homeland clean» to 27 schools in our district and to more than 250 SPARE schools in the Central Federal District. In July 2020, summer school camps will open, and we hope that schoolchildren will organize the month "Cleanliness of water bodies!". Read and use our brochure in your work!