2. English Teacher Support Unit 14
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The Environment and You
Before we start……….
You have now completed 13 TSUs and your students have now become more confident to express their
ideas on a wide variety of topics. While earlier, they used a lot more Odia, they have increasingly become
more comfortable using English. The fact that they have thought about issues that are interesting to them
and affect them deeply, has helped them to develop their own voice. They have something to say and they
want to be heard and you have created an environment where they can be heard; you have given them a
platform to speak. Why don't you list down all the topics your students have enjoyed speaking and writing
about?
The Fourteenth TSU
This TSU, the Environment and You, is important for any concerned citizen of the world. The activities in
the TSU aim to help students think about the world they live in, the present state of this world and what it
could become. The activities help them to reflect on and understand the interconnectedness of all living
things, and how the survival of life on earth depends on all of us making responsible choices.
Activity 1 – The School and You (Group Work)
Ask your students to work in groups and discuss all the things they have noticed in the school that are in a
dilapidated and broken-down condition. Ask them to look around and find things that are dirty, unhygienic,
smelly, etc. Ask them to write these down in the form of a list, if possibly in the order of priorities. (e.g.,
‘broken blackboard’ might come ahead of, ‘dirty outer wall’). You can then ask the students to present
their list to the rest of the class. Other groups can add points to their lists as they listen to the
presentations.
• Now ask students to look at their final lists. Next to each problem area, ask them to write down
who or what is to blame for the problem. You can draw this table on the board and ask the
students to copy it. You can give them an example of a problem and ask for suggestions about who
or what is to be blamed for the problem. It will be interesting to find out how students assign
responsibility for things that go wrong.
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Problem Who is to blame
Cobwebs on the ceilings The peon? Lack of long brooms to clean
cobwebs? The government for not assigning
enough funds for brooms, etc?
Broken desks and chairs
Now ask students to think about how they can make a difference in their school preferably without
much external help. For example, it may be possible to find a long stick and tie a broom to it and
use it for removing cobwebs. Encourage them to become responsible for their own class, the
playground, etc. Ask them if they would like to take on responsibilities to maintain the school, e.g.
making sure that students throw rubbish in designated areas, keeping the area near drinking water
taps clean, etc.
Here are some additional activities that you can consider for further group work:
o Can the students make dust-bins using thick paper or broken pots or buckets? Is it possible
to teach them to segregate organic waste (food items, paper, vegetables, etc) from inorganic
waste (plastic covers, metal scraps, etc). Organic waste, as you know, can be recycled – that
is, it can be converted into compost to be used as fertilizer for plants. You may want to
encourage students to dig a pit and bury the organic waste to allow it to become compost
over time. If you don’t have a garden in your school, you may encourage your students to
help create one, with the help of compost created of the organic waste that they
segregated.
o Can the outer walls of the school’s buildings provide the space for the students’ artistic
expressions? Use inexpensive colouring material including colour chalk. You may even think
of theme-based drawings, slogans and short poems which may be changed from time to
time.
o If your school has a playground, can you find a way to clean it and allocate responsibilities
among students to maintain it?
Can you think of more activities to engage the students about environmental concerns of the
school?
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Did it work?
interesting difficult boring
Activity 2 – Clean Drinking Water Campaign (Group Work)
Have a discussion in the class for about 15 minutes on the need for keeping sources of your
village’s drinking water – lake, river, pond, stream – clean. What are water-borne diseases?
(Amoebiasis, dysentery, jaundice, etc) If ponds and rivers are filthy and polluted what are the health
consequences for the people in the village?
Explain how contaminated drinking water is one of the major causes of health problems in India as
well as in Odisha and in Sambalpur. In some places in India, it is the leading cause of death among
children. Ask students to do a 'cleanliness' survey of the water bodies in their village. How can
pollution of water bodies be measured? Try to get them to talk to a government official from the
pollution control department. You could get them to write to him or her asking for suggestions for
keeping water bodies clean.
Did it work?
interesting difficult boring
Activity - 3: How can water be cleaned?
There are inexpensive ways to clean water. Here are some of them, listed for you. Share the
information with children and ask them to create diagrams of how such models work. If possible,
you could also encourage them to create a simple model. You may consider holding a community
meeting in the school premises where your students can explain the need for safe drinking water
and inexpensive methods for providing clean drinking water.
What is the focus of this activity?...................................................
Did you make any modifications or try out
variations?..............................................................................................
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What is the focus of this activity?...................................................
Did you make any modifications or try out
variations?..............................................................................................
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Ceramic filters
You can make a water filter using only clay, sawdust and a plastic bucket. Mix clay with
combustible material like sawdust or rice husks, give it a flower pot shape and fire it in a brick kiln
(surely you must be having one near your village?). The sawdust or rice husk burns away, leaving
tiny pores in the ceramic through which water filters. This kind of filter is used to reduce disease in
many areas across the world.
Slow sand filtration
Unlike ceramic filters that work for individual households, “slow sand filtration” can work for an
entire community's water source. A slow sand filtration system is a combination of several parts:
water storage tanks, pre-filters, slow sand filters, disinfection stages, and filtered water storage
tanks. The number of filters and filter types that are used in a given slow sand filtration system will
depend on the quality of the source water.
Slow sand filters work through the formation of a gelatinous layer (or biofilm) in the top few
millimetres of the fine sand layer. The Schmutzdecke is formed in the first 10–20 days of operation
and consists of bacteria, fungi, protozoa, etc. As water passes through the bio-layer, particles of
foreign matter are trapped and dissolved organic material is absorbed and metabolised by the
bacteria, fungi and protozoa. The water produced from a well-managed slow sand filter can be of
exceptionally good quality.
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Bamboo Charcoal
Bamboo Charcoal is considered an excellent water filtering agent. A good quantity of bamboo
charcoal can be used to filter water, along with other material like sand.
Solar sterilization
The cheapest way to clean water is to leave it in a plastic bottle in the sunlight. Leave clear bottles
in the sun for a few hours and the UV radiation and heat kills the microbes that cause diarrhea and
other waterborne illness.
There may be some traditional methods to filter water in your area. Ask the students to find out
more from elders at home and in the village. Can your students take a lead in providing the village
with clean drinking water? If they can do that, it may earn them (and you!) the gratitude of the
entire village.
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Did it work?
interesting difficult boring
Activity – 4: Tricky Issues to Debate (Group Work)
Decisions regarding environment are not always easy. Often, there is a ‘trade-off’ involved – for e.g,
(cheap/user-friendly process could actually cause long term environmental damage). Sooner or
later, your students will be making tough decisions regarding environmental protection. Why not
make them think about some tricky situations and have them debate their views?
Form two groups. Let others be observers. Those who are observers for the first debate can be in
groups for the second debate. Make sure that everyone in the class gets an opportunity to take part
in the debate on at least one of the following themes. Of course, you may include themes of your
choice.
How will you react in the following situations?
A. A company that pollutes the river in your village offers to divert its pollutants and effluents
further downstream. Your village will no longer suffer the effects of pollution. Is this acceptable?
(Those who say ‘yes’ form one group and those who say ‘no’ form another group). Let them submit
their arguments in writing. Then have a quick wrap-up discussion.
B. Your gram panchayat decides to impose a fine on smoking, pan spitting, (in public places) cutting
trees, etc. One could indulge in these activities but one has to pay a small fine.
C. A company that manufactures a soft-drink plans to set up a factory near your village. It will suck
water out of the ground and the village many face water scarcity but the company will also provide
employment to village youth, provide small business opportunities to everyone, etc. Everyone will
prosper but the water sources will be depleted.
D. A paper manufacturing company which is responsible for much of the deforestation in your
neighbourhood offers free notebooks for all the students in your school. You are the
representative of the students and the school administration wants to know if they should say
“Yes” to the offer.
You can add more topics for debates, depending on the interests of your students.
What is the focus of this activity?...................................................
Did you make any modifications or try out
variations?..............................................................................................
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Did it work?
interesting difficult boring
Activity - 5: Saving the peacock
Discuss with the students about how environment damage often stems from thoughtlessness and
greed. Talk about how human beings destroy their environment because they want to make money
as quickly as possible and don't often think or care about the long-term consequences of their
actions. There are many topics you can discuss in this connection - students may already have read
about some of these in earlier classes or in other subjects like science and social science. Here are
some they may be familiar with:
• Deforestation and its consequences
• Industrial pollution of water, land and air
• The excessive use of pesticides
• The depletion of resources like coal, oil and gas
You can then discuss the consequences of destroying the environment - not only does it affect
human beings but also disturbs the ecological balance of the earth. One of the main consequences is
destruction of the habitats of animals, driving many animals to extinction.
The tiger, the national animal of India is an endangered species. Students may be aware if this. Tell
them that another national emblem, the national bird of India, the peacock may also be facing a
similar future. Large numbers of peacocks are killed so that people can buy their beautiful feathers
for decorations. Their fat is supposed to help cure arthritis.
You can ask your students to create a campaign to save the peacock. You can divide them into
groups and ask them to choose their task. Here are some tasks you could suggest.
• A poster campaign
• A poem or song
• A skit
• A series of illustrations telling a story to convince people that this bird should be protected
• A cartoon strip
What is the focus of this activity?...................................................
Did you make any modifications or try out
variations?..............................................................................................
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You can also ask students if they have any other ideas. Give them a few days to complete their
projects. They may need help from you with facts and arguments. Perhaps they can use the library
for this. When they have completed their work, you can put up the posters on the notice board or
hold an exhibition where they can put up their posters, recite their poems, etc.
Did it work?
interesting difficult boring
Textbook activity - Grammar
1. Using reported speech - sentence completion
Ask students to complete these sentences in any way they want. This can be done as pair work.
Students may feel more comfortable writing down their answers before speaking.
a. My mother told me...
b. My friend asked me if I ...
c. The policeman asked the little boy...
d. The doctor explained that ...
e. I requested the bus driver to ...
f. The carpenter ordered his assistant to...
Add more sentences of your choice. They could first attempt this exercise in their mother tongue,
so that they understand what reported speech is. You could then help students to formulate their
answers in English. You could add sentences from the textbook.
2. Using reported speech - a simple speaking activity
Ask one student to say something to another student in one or two sentences. Ask the second
student to tell you what the first student had said.
You could give students a topic around which they can construct sentences. What they like or
dislike, their school, a local event, etc. You can also use any of the various topics that have been
discussed in the TSUs so far.
Do not focus on rules at this point. If the students make mistakes, you can repeat the correct
sentences so that they listen to you and understand how sentences in reported speech are formed.
What is the focus of this activity?...................................................
Did you make any modifications or try out
variations?..............................................................................................
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