(Submitted photo/Tanya McCallum)

By Joanie Olson

Saving Mother Earth

Sturgeon Lake Central School celebrates Earth Day year round

Apr 22, 2021 | 3:00 PM

Every year on this day the world comes together to celebrate Earth Day.

Originally starting in 1970, it marked the beginning of the modern environment movement to bring awareness of the importance of caring for our planet, something that touches the lives of all races and cultures globally.

At the grassroots level, a local school west of Prince Albert has taken the protection of the planet seriously, teaching the students to not only celebrate the event one day a year but year round.

Sturgeon Lake Central School’s land-based teacher Tanya McCallum said local Elders of the community felt it imperative to teach the importance of developing a relationship with the earth.

“This relationship is primarily developed by spending time outdoors in the school yard and along the lakeshores. Children are encouraged to use the gifts Creator gave them to interact with other life forms of Mother Earth including plants, animals and the elements of nature,” McCallum told paNOW.

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Staff and students at the school, for the first time this year have integrated Earth Day with their vision to connect the children back to the land and create environmental awareness.

For three weeks, the teachers focus on teaching the importance of protecting the earth through growing plants, tree planting and picking up litter. Once the ice melts, they will start cleaning the shoreline using canoes and kayaks.

The land-based teaching method used by the school has been well received by all the students. McCallum said it is unbelievable how much the children are grasping the concept of their environmental awareness.

“For example, one of the Grade One students said before she planted the tree, ‘I hope you have a good life, tree,'” said McCallum. “It touched my heart because that it what it is all about.”

To the staff and students at Sturgeon Lake Central School, Earth Day is every day and McCallum’s focus is to instill that into the children every day the importance of protecting our planet. She shared how the kids will voluntarily pick up litter on their nature hikes and remind other students not to pick the live plants and to do their part to protect Mother Nature.

Tanya McCallum tree planting with Grade One students from Sturgeon Lake Central School. (Submitted photo/Tanya McCallum)

A rally had been organized to recognize the official date of April 22, but weather conditions were not in their favor. McCallum said the children love the land-based teaching program, learning about nature, plants, animals, and fish.

McCallum’s next teaching unit is about learning the importance of protecting the water resources.

Young voice makes climate plea

Amid international Earth Day events to promote the fight against climate change, another young voice—albeit a little older than the kids at Sturgeon Lake Central School—urged the United States to end fossil fuel subsidies.

Well-known activist Greta Thunberg, 18, made the call to Congress at a House Oversight Committee hearing on the issue.

“The fact that we are still having this discussion and even more that we are still subsidizing fossil fuels directly or indirectly using taxpayer money is a disgrace,” she said.

Earlier today, the Joe Biden administration opened an online global climate summit including 40 world leaders with a pledge to cut the climate-wrecking coal and petroleum fumes that the U.S. pumps out at least in half. It’s a commitment Biden hopes will spur China and other big polluters to speed up efforts of their own.

With files from The Canadian Press

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joan.olson@pattisonmedia.ca

On Twitter: @Olson_Joani