World Environment Day falls on 5 June, and it is very easy to mark badly. A poster, a slogan
the children cannot read, a photograph, done. We try to do the one version of it that a
four-year-old can actually hold on to: give them a living thing and make them responsible
for it.

One pot each

Every child fills their own pot, pushes in a seed, waters it and writes their name on a label
— or produces the marks that stand in for their name, which counts. The pots stay at
school, lined up where they can be seen.

Then comes the part that does the teaching. There is a watering rota. Children forget. A pot
dries out and somebody notices and is upset about it. That is not a failure of the activity;
it is the activity.

Why we do not lead with the big picture

Climate change, pollution and deforestation are real and urgent, and they are also abstract,
frightening and entirely outside a small child’s control — which is a poor
combination for a three-year-old. At this age the useful work is much smaller and much more
concrete:

• Something alive depends on you, and you have to remember it
• Soil is full of things, and worms are good news
• Food waste goes in the compost, and months later it turns into soil again
• Water runs out if you leave the tap on

Children who grow up handling soil and looking after plants tend to care about the larger thing
later. Children lectured about the larger thing at four mostly learn to look worried.

The compost heap

Our compost heap is the most popular feature of the garden, entirely because of the worms. It
takes the fruit scraps from snack time, and the children can lift the lid and check on it.
Turning rubbish into soil is, to a four-year-old, straightforwardly magic.

The seedlings that make it go home at the end of the month, with instructions.