How to talk about the environment to children?


This text is taken from the Courrier de la Planète of November 15, 2022. To subscribe, Click here.

Scientists anticipate a bleak future for the planet and its beauty, its biodiversity, even its viability. A reader, Stéphanie Couture, asks us how to talk to children about the environment without frightening them about the world that awaits them.

The duty posed the question to mothers, authors, a psychologist and a teacher to find out how to approach the peril to come without frightening – or discouraging – the adults of tomorrow.

At a young age, a child should not have to carry the weight of the world on his shoulders, believes psychologist Ines Lopes. ” [Avec les enfants] very young, it is not necessary to approach the environment from the angle of its problems. Rather, it is about cultivating a connection with nature and a sense of gratitude towards it. »

“It’s not denial,” says Dr. Lopes. It’s just that a child under 10 doesn’t necessarily need to hear about the sixth extinction. »

This is the approach that Mireille Levert advocated in her children’s story One day I will rock the Earth. The author and illustrator wanted to write a “long poem to nature” to celebrate its beauty, and not to tell of the threats that darken its horizon. “We always talk about everything that’s wrong, but for me, even though I’m a big culture lover, nature still has a beauty that’s really hard to beat. »

Mother and spokesperson for the environmental cause in Quebec, Laure Waridel also believes that children must first be brought into contact with nature and marvel at it. When hers were young, she explains, she mainly tried to develop “a bond of love” between them and nature.

“We take care of what we love and to love, you have to know,” she believes. Excursions in the forest, walks along the water’s edge, observation sessions of flowers, plants, birds: here are so many opportunities to “cultivate a look for the beauty of the world”, according to Laure Waridel, so that continues into adulthood.

Lead by example

Children hear the news and absorb the state of the world on radio, TV and adult conversations. “They are sponges, they are very permeable to the anxieties that surround them”, assures Lucie Sauvé, professor at UQAM and emeritus member of the Center for Research in Education and Training relating to the environment and eco-citizenship. .

We must educate children about the beauty of the world, believes the researcher, but above all we must “listen to them and invite them to speak up, to express what they know and what they feel” about nature.

“Even as children, they are eco-citizens, capable of being critical of the actions they witness,” assures Ms. Sauvé. They stamp the door of real life and are themselves actors in their world. »

Even if climate change does not bode well for humanity – the UN Secretary General, Antonio Guterres, even drawing a parallel between inaction and a “collective suicide pact” at the opening of COP27 -, it is important to inculcate a “can-do” in children. “We must, according to Lucie Sauvé, teach them that they can have an impact. »

A member of the Mères au front collective, Laure Waridel believes that parents should also lead by example with children. “Pick up waste on the ground with them, recycle, turn off the water while brushing their teeth: these are small gestures that raise awareness and show that they can act. »

It is also important, according to psychologist Ines Lopes, to give children the right time. “When they ask a question or raise a problem, we must not hide the truth from them, but we must also talk to them about the solutions to thwart the feeling of helplessness and fatality. »

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