YOUTli TEACH YOUTH 

 by Jack and Jim McLean 

 I Brady High School Sophomores 



President Nixon has developed a new 

 set of "3 R's". They are (1) Reform our 

 government and its institutions'^ (2) Res- 

 toration of our environment, (3) Renewal 

 of the faith people have in America. We 

 will be discussing the first "R" which is 

 Reform. Reforming our institutions in- 

 cludes updating our school systems. We 

 Bust develop conservation education in 

 our schools today, if we are to be as- 

 sured that our natural resources of tomor- 

 row will be used wisely. 



Brady High School recently offered, 

 as a new subject, an Independent Study 

 Program. The subject was begun so stud- 

 ents could explore fields of their own 

 individual interests. The student must 

 set up goals which he will try to com- 

 plete by the end of the semester and also 

 which he will be graded by on how he com- 

 pletes them. We were interested in con- 

 servation so we took an Independent Study 



Course on Conservation E*Jcation. As 

 part of our course, we educated ourselves 

 I through reading, tours, etc., and in OcC- 

 'ober we began teaching conservation to 

 the fltst. Second, and Third grades of 

 Brady Grade School. 



In preparation for teaching class we 

 gathered information for conservation edu- 

 cation from the Forest Service, SWCDs, 

 Extension Service, and other sources. 

 One book we found very helpful was "People 

 and Their Environment, Grades 1-3". This 

 book is published by the J. G. Ferguson 

 Publishing Co., Chicago, 111. The book, 

 which is available from grades 1-8, has 

 complete lessons plans, addresses for more 

 available resources, etc. We also took a 

 correspondence course from the Univer- 

 sity of Nebraska on Conservation of 

 Natural Resources. 



In our first lesson, we used a flan- 

 nel board, and told of a boy and girl who 

 went for a walk in the woods for a pic- 

 nic. During the picnic they did many 

 good things (played) and bad things (lit- 

 tered, carved on trees, started fires). 

 After their picnic they started a fire 



to roast marshmallows. The fire later 

 spread to the grass and trees and soon 

 caused a forest fire, just because the 

 children weren't careful. 



We asked the students what the child- 

 ren in the story had done wrong and what 

 was right. We explained that a Natural 

 Resource was a gift of nature and that 

 forest fires destroy these things. We 

 discussed the effect the forest fire had 

 on the air, the water, the animals, the 

 plants and minerals, and of course, man. 

 This gave us a foundation to build on. 

 From there on, we discussed each natural 

 resource in detail and how it effects 

 people, why we should use them properly, 

 and how to stop the poor use of them. 



We also tried to get the student in- 

 volved in conservation so that they would 

 become interested. We would let them 

 draw pictures of conservation and then 

 tell the class about their pictures. Also 

 we would make things like posters, litter 

 bags, plant trees, etc. Then at the end 

 of each lesson, we would have the child- 

 ren tell us what they could do toward the 

 conservation cause (like prevent forest 

 fires.) 



You may be wondering why we are main- 

 ly interested in teaching the young peo- 

 ple. We believe that if we educated the 

 youth of today, the future generations 

 will not use our natural resources fool- 

 ishly. 



(This page is sponsored by the Ladies Aux- 

 iliary, MASWCD.) 



"vVIrlcht. alright, I'll come look — what 

 hnve you donv with (hat silly saw now?" 



