Plastic – Free our Sea - WDC, Whale and Dolphin … · Plastic – Free our Sea ... and...

Plastic – Free our Sea

Factual information and worksheets for teaching purposes in primary schools about plastic waste in oceans.

Plastic – Free our SeaFactual information and worksheets for teaching purposes in primary schools about plastic waste in oceans.

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Preface

Dear Teachers,

Whales are starving to death with their stomachs filled with plastic and a garbage patch as huge as Europe is drifting in the Pacific Ocean. Meanwhile in the US, 2.5 million plastic bottles are thrown away every hour and more than 10,000 coffee to-go cups are sold in the UK in just two minutes.1 The sea is wide, deep and mysterious, but if we stick with our current lifestyle, our planet will soon look like a “waste-land”. Our international organization, Whale and Dolphin Conservation (WDC) aims to educate grade school children about plastic waste in oceans with our Plastic – Free our Sea campaign, to point out the consequences of our reckless behavior and to prepare them for a future where people consume responsibly and produce less garbage.

The teaching material regarding the Plastic – Free our Sea project contains useful facts and includes various games, worksheets for school units, and ideas for activities on theme days or during the school week.

We wish you the best of luck in your efforts.

Kind Regards

Monica PepePolicy ManagerWDC USA

PS.: After you’ve addressed the topic of plastic waste in oceans with your students and used the WDC teaching material, we would be happy to hear your feedback. Your experiences and your suggestions for future projects are important to us.

1 http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-36882799 and http://www.carryyourcup.org/get-the-facts

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Content

Part 1

Worksheet 1 – A Dangerous Mix-up 5

Worksheet 2 – Waste Isn’t Always the Same 7

Worksheet 3 – Too Much Waste in the Ocean 9

Worksheet 4 – Detecting Microplastics in Cosmetic Products 11

Worksheet 5 – What can I do? 13

Game Idea: “Plastic on the Plate” 14

Part 2

Factual Information for Teachers 16

Factual Information – Worksheet 1 17





Factual Information – Game Idea: “Plastic on the Plate” 23

Plastic Waste – We Get Active! 24

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A Dangerous Mix-up

Simon desperately tries to put on his flippers – swim trunks, sun lotion, diving goggles, snorkel, all gear is ready – but strangely enough these silly flippers just won’t fit his feet. From the towel next to him Simon hears his little sister Nina getting frustrated: “Mommy, these flippers are too big; I’ll lose them even before I can reach the water.” Alright, it’s obvious, Nina and her brother mixed up their flippers. That is not a big deal; the flippers are switched back quickly and the two kids stomp happily towards the sea. It’s finally summer, finally vacation time and off they go exploring the underwater world.

After snorkeling only a few meters Simon and Nina can already find their first few little fish, some mussels lie nearby and straight ahead they can even spot a sea star sitting on the rocks. But what is that? Something shimmers colorfully and it slowly moves through the water back and forth; this must be a very special fish. Simon holds the handle of his landing net strongly and takes a deep breath, determined to catch that fish. He dives into the water and, while approaching, he wonders why the glittering fish does not try to flee the site. Even closer to the mysterious object he realizes his mistake: this is not a fish and it is not a shimmering mussel either. It is in fact a plastic bottle someone has thrown away. Disappointed, Simon resurfaces and keeps his eyes open for his sister. Nina is snorkeling next to the rocks ahead and is pulling her full landing net along behind her. Did she already find that many mussels? Or did she catch so many fish? No, Nina took over the role of a garbage catcher. Her net is filled with waste: a plastic bag, an old can and other wrapping material. Back on the beach Simon and Nina sort their worrying findings and instead of mussels and stones, today the two kids use garbage for decorating their sandcastle so that other people become aware of what is happening underneath the ocean’s surface.

Can you imagine how it looks underneath the water?

Draw or build a collage of the underwater world as it is seen by Simon and Nina through their diving goggles. What can be found underneath the surface? Use Simon’s diving goggles as a frame for your picture.

Try to find out together why the story is titled “a dangerous mix-up”.

Worksheet 1

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Waste Isn’t Always the Same

What happens to the plastic waste in the ocean?

Whenever apple leftovers land in the sea, they get decomposed by many, many little organisms – so-called microorganisms. After around two months there are no apple pieces left that you can see with your naked eye. Other waste materials such as banana peels, paper or wooden objects need a bit more time and effort to vanish. So what about plastic? Plastic disassembles with the help of wind and water to smaller and even smaller particles, but these plastic pieces stay in the ocean forever and eventually get eaten by mussels, snails, fish and other animals.

Which waste material disappears the fastest and which ones takes longer? Color the depicted waste materials, cut them out and attach them to the timeline in the correct order.

Worksheet 2

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Too Much Waste in the Ocean

Every year between 4.8 and 12.7 million tons of plastic waste is added into our oceans2. If this trend continues like this, plastic will outweigh fish by the year 20503. If you covered the hallway of your school with plastic, it would approximately reflect the amount of waste that lands in our oceans every 15 seconds (!). Inconceivable, isn’t it?

The waste in the ocean originates from our streets, beaches and landfills. It sometimes gets thrown away carelessly and through sewage channels, streams and rivers it reaches the sea. It makes its way from our cities to the ocean, is blown into the sea by winds on the coastline and is thrown into the water on beaches or from ships without thinking.

Worksheet 3

2 J. R. Jambeck, R. Geyer, C. Wilcox, T. R. Siegler, M. Perryman, A. Andrady, R. Narayan, K. L. Law: Plastic waste inputs from land into the ocean. In: Science. 347, 2015, S. 768–771, doi:10.1126/science.1260352.3 World Economic Forum / Ellen MacArthur Foundation http://www3.weforum.org/docs/WEF_The_New_Plastics_Economy.pdf

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Detecting Microplastics in Cosmetic Products

Plastic is a great material because it is extremely versatile and therefore used in many different products. A world without plastic is hardly conceivable these days. Plastic bottles, plastic bumpers, plastic toys, plastic forks, plastic computer cases … but plastic shampoo and plastic lipstick, too? You read it correctly- even in cosmetic products there is a lot of hidden plastic. How much, you might ask? Try finding out yourself!

Step 1

Start your search (in your house, at a local store, or online) for as many cosmetics as you can find. Scan the labels of each product for one of the following terms:

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These terms are clear hints that the product contains microplastics. If you can find a product with one or more of these ingredients, bring it to school for your plastic experiment. You can also look up the manufacturer’s contact information and send them a letter telling them to stop using plastic in their products.

Step 2

What does the plastic in your cosmetic product look like? Find out yourself with this easy experiment.

Take an empty tea bag and fill it with some of your product. Hold the bag in a sink or bowl and let some water run through it until the substance is washed away. What’s left in your bag is … PLASTIC! This is plastic that normally would be washed into the ocean, passing through rivers and lakes and eventually getting eaten by small and big marine life.

Worksheet 4

The most common plastics in cosmetic products and their abbreviations.

4 UNEP Plastic in Cosmetics 2015 Factsheet (http://staging.unep.org/gpa/documents/publications/PlasticinCosmetics2015Factsheet.pdf)

Nylon-12 (polyamide-12)Nylon-6Poly(butylene terephthalate)Poly(ethylene isoterephthalate)Poly(ethylene terephthalate)Poly(methyl methylacrylate) Poly(pentaerythrityl terephthalate)Poly(propylene terephthalate) PolyethylenePolypropylenePolystyrene

Polytetrafluoroethylene (Teflon)PolyurethanePolyacrylateAcrylates copolymerAllyl stearate/vinyl acetate copolymersEthylene/propylene/styrene copolymerEthylene/methylacrylate copolymerEthylene/acrylate copolymerButylene/ethylene/styrene copolymerStyrene acrylates copolymerTrimethylsiloxysilicate (silicone resin)

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Worksheet 4

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3

4 5

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What can I do to avoid plastic waste?

Write your ideas for producing less plastic waste in Nina’s speech bubbles and present them to your classmates.

Worksheet 5

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This game addresses the accumulation of plastics in our food chain and its route onto our plates.

Note: This game is most suitable for outdoors or being played in a large gym space.

Preparation:

Students will cut out the cards and name the animals shown. There should be as many cards as there are taking part in the game. Make sure that you stick to the following numerical proportion as closely as possible:

2 big fish, 6 small fish, 12 pieces of plankton = 20 kids

Game Play:

Together you determine how the animals in the game move (plankton floats, small fish swim fast, big fish swim slow etc.). You also point out who eats who: A big fish eats the smaller ones, which in turn search for the plankton.

Every player receives a card with a picture, and immediately turns into the animal shown and starts moving in the ways specified above.

The plankton pieces spread throughout the room. Small fish try to catch the plankton (for example by swimming next to them, touching their shoulders and afterwards moving on together). After a while the big fish join the game and try their best to get a hold of the small fish.

Second Round:

How do the plastic pieces accumulate in our food chain? How do they get onto our plates? Every student given a plankton card receives a small bag with three marbles. The marbles symbolize the microplastics eaten by the plankton. At this point the students start making their way through the food chain the second time. If a small fish eats a plankton piece, it takes over the whole bag with the marbles, too. If a big fish eats a small fish, it takes over all of the already “eaten” bags. At the end the two big fish have all of the marbles, representing plastics in their stomachs.

Did you know?If dead whales get washed up onto beaches, in some places around the globe they are heavily contaminated with toxic substances so they need to be disposed of as hazardous waste. Toxins accumulate in every single layer of the food chain and finally compile in the whale’s blubber.

Game Idea: “Plastic on the Plate”

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Game Idea: “Plastic on the Plate”

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Plastic pollution in the world’s oceans has become a global problem. Every ocean now contains waste material. Most of it originates from land and gets flushed into the sea through rivers and streams. Waste is a serious hazard for any form of marine life. Creatures such as whales and dolphins can get stuck in it or confuse it with food. On top of that, the waste destroys coral reefs, pollutes beaches and threatens human health since the waste eaten by fish eventually ends up on our plates.

Factual Information for Teachers

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A plastic bag floating in the water looks just like the favorite food of sea turtles – jellyfish. If a turtle swallows one of these bags, the animal is not able to digest it and generate energy. The bag remains in the turtle’s stomach together with other waste material and eventually causes death.

It is not only turtles that mix up waste with food. The stomachs of dolphins, whales, sea birds and seals often contain a lot of garbage that was mistaken for nutritious food and ultimately resulted in the animal’s death. Scientists found 17 kilograms (37 pounds) of plastic waste in the stomach of a stranded sperm whale on the Spanish coast5. As the hazardous material fills the stomach, it does not provide nourishment, therefore leading the animal to potentially ingest even more.

Additionally, plastic waste not only looks like food for whales and turtles, it can also turn into a fatal trap. Thousands of whales, dolphins, seals and sea birds are estimated to become entangled every year in fishing lines, fishing nets, plastic sheets and other debris. Once trapped, they are not always able to free themselves.

The story “a dangerous mix-up” is a good introduction to the topic of plastic waste in the ocean. Read the story together with your students, try to answer the questions, and let the kids draw a picture of the underwater world.

Factual Information - Worksheet 1

5 http://ac.els-cdn.com/S0025326X13000489/1-s2.0-S0025326X13000489-main.pdf?_tid=7bccb5fc-734a-11e6-8f4b-00000aacb360&acdnat=1473067622_ec6a5ad91ae74eb27dcb84821f9733e8

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An apple thrown into the ocean will soon start to rot and after around two months it is fully decomposed. Plastic waste, however, will remain forever once it reaches the ocean. The reason lies in the tiny microorganisms that can decompose an apple completely but not any plastic material. Scientists use the term “biologically inert” to express this resistance. The only real way to break down plastic is through photodegradation. This kind of decomposition requires sunlight, not bacteria. UV rays break the bonds between the long molecular chains of the plastic, thereby a big piece of plastic turns into many little pieces.6 It is estimated that a foam plastic cup will take 50 years, a plastic beverage holder will take 400 years, a disposable diaper will take 450 years and fishing line will take 600 years to degrade.7 But even when these and other products pass the process of decomposition, the plastic does not disappear and instead is a permanent part of the marine food chain. Eventually, the material ends up on the menu of small and big fish, whales, dolphins, seals, turtles and humans.

The students try to arrange the garbage pieces on the timeline in what they believe to be the correct order. Afterwards you will arrange the pieces one more time together with the students in the correct order and see which product remains in the water the longest.

Solution:

6 http://science.howstuffworks.com/science-vs-myth/everyday-myths/how-long-does-it-take-for-plastics-to-biodegrade.htm7 Lytle, Claire Le Guern. „Plastic Pollution“. Coastal Care. Retrieved19 February 2015

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How does plastic waste get into the ocean?

Every year between 4.8 and 12.7 million tons of plastic waste is added into our oceans8. In 2013 scientists calculated that there are already 100 to 150 million tons of waste in our oceans. 60% of it is plastic. 70% of the waste sinks to the ocean bed and is therefore not visible to our eyes.9 If we keep adding waste into our oceans at this pace, by 2050 we will have more plastic waste than fish in our oceans.10 Where do all the plastics come from? Our streets, beaches and landfills. In fact, only 20% of the waste floating in the oceans was thrown away directly on the ocean. The larger portion of it originates from our beaches and streets, gets flushed into the sea through rivers and sewage systems or is blown out by winds11.

The kids draw arrows to demonstrate the waste’s route into the ocean.


8 J. R. Jambeck, R. Geyer, C. Wilcox, T. R. Siegler, M. Perryman, A. Andrady, R. Narayan, K. L. Law: Plastic waste inputs from land into the ocean. In: Science. 347, 2015, S. 768–771, doi:10.1126/science.12603529 Umwelt und Verbraucher, Deutschlandfunk, 11. April 2013, Anja Nehls: Müllhalde Meer, deutschlandfunk.de, 12. Dezember 2013.10 World Economic Forum / Ellen MacArthur Foundation http://www3.weforum.org/docs/WEF_The_New_Plastics_Economy.pdf11 http://www.unep.org/regionalseas/marinelitter/publications/docs/plastic_ocean_report.pdf

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Microplastics in Cosmetics

Almost invisible, millions of little plastic pieces enter our waste water every day and, through rivers and streams, they reach the oceans. The manufacturers of shampoos, lipsticks, body lotions and shower gels often mix little plastic beads into our daily cosmetics. By washing them off our bodies, we rinse the plastic particles directly into the sewage system. Since treatment plants are not able to filter the little pieces, they get passed into rivers and oceans where fish and other marine organisms ingest and transport them directly onto our plates.

We can distinguish between primary and secondary microplastics. Primary microplastics include pellets, which serve as the base material for plastic production and for plastics used in the cosmetic industry. Secondary microplastics on the other hand are pieces of plastics that emerge through weathering, wave motion and solar radiation. Both primary and secondary microplastics are similar in that they remain in the ocean for decades and get spread out evenly by waves and currents.

In our environment plastics function as a “magnet” for pollutants and thus the concentration of these pollutants can be a hundred times higher in microplastics as it is in the ocean. This is because of the specific physical and chemical characteristics of plastic. Another reason for the high concentration of pollutants is the early enrichment of plastics with chemicals during their production process. Whenever animals eat microplastics they ingest the pollutants with it.

Execute the experiment shown on the worksheet with your students in order to find out how many plastics the different cosmetics contain.

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The students collect their ideas and proposals for producing less plastic waste on their worksheets and then present their own personal waste prevention plans to the group. Some examples are included below.

I will …

… not throw away waste carelessly but dispose of it responsibly.

… waive single-use plastic bags for shopping.

… waive certain products, such as cookies, croissants or fruit, needlessly wrapped in plastic.

… spread the word about waste in the oceans so that we can act in concert to avoid plastic waste.

… remind my parents to use reusable bags for shopping and to avoid unnecessary plastic wrapping.


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Plastics as Food

At the base of every food chain are the producers (mostly plants) which are then followed by consumers. The very last instance in the chain is usually a top predator (e.g. orca).

In the ocean algae are primary producers. They convert CO² into biomass. Algae floating in the ocean’s top layer are called phytoplankton. They build the nutrition basis for small crustaceans called zooplankton. The zooplankton (and also small fish) are thus primary consumers. Humpback whales hunt the zooplankton and fish and belong to the second trophic level – they are secondary consumers. The food chain quantitatively resembles a pyramid: a humpback whale eats 1 to 1.5 tons of zooplankton that in turn eat approximately 130,000 phytoplankton per day.

Since phytoplankton already ingests microplastics on its very low level (producers) in the food chain, the material is transferred from one animal to the next along the chain, and during that process it accumulates more and more. In this way, microplastics get ingested by fish that eventually land on our plate and thus the material finds its way into our bodies.

Plastic contains chemical substances such as the hormonally-active bisphenol A. Additionally it binds chemicals in the ocean and accumulates them. Studies show the eventual release of dangerous or toxic substances like bisphenol A, phthalates or styrol compounds as a consequence of the decomposition process of plastics. Those can accumulate in the food chain, harm the genetic material of marine animals, influence their hormonal balance or even affect humans in the long term.12

Factual Information – Game “Plastic on the Plate”

12 http://www.ecowatch.com/7-types-of-plastic-wreaking-havoc-on-our-health-1882198584.html

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Actions for a plastic-free ocean!

Let’s address this problem together and make a mark against piling up plastic waste in the world of whales and dolphins! With collaborative action we can inform others, raise awareness for the endangerment of global oceans and make a difference.

Faithful companions

Print or paint simple fabric bags and sell them to friends and family. That way you can inform people about the importance of reusing one’s shopping bag and simultaneously collect money for a donation to a worthy cause.

Plastic artwork

Collect all the plastic waste you see in the streets and build “waste-sculptures” that you sell at the next school event or present them for informational purposes.

A plastic-free dinner

Accompany your parents to the supermarket and try to buy a completely plastic free dinner.

Plastic collection

Collect all plastics that accrue at your house for one week. Take the material to school. How much plastic waste does your class produce in one week? A lot? Record your plastic collection for your final report and then use the plastics to build artwork (e.g. a whale sculpture). You could also start a friendly competition among your classmates to see who can produce the least amount of plastic each week.

Plastic diet

No drinks in plastic bottles or plastic cups for one week can’t be that hard, can it? Try it yourself! For the next week opt not to drink anything that comes from a plastic bottle, plastic cup or plastic bag. With the WDC Kids-Whale-Collection-Passport you can track your success. Color one whale for every day you live without plastic drinks. Good luck!

Plastic Waste – We Get Active!

Plastic diet = Free our Sea

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Imprint / Publisher

WDC, Whale and Dolphin Conservation North America7 Nelson Street, PlymouthMassachusetts 02360United StatesT +1 888 699 4253

whales.org

WDC, Whale and Dolphin Conservation GermanyImplerstr. 5581371 MunichGermany

Author: Ruth Schloegl, Annika WinterTranslation: Maximilian Gabriel, Monica PepeDesign: Roman Richter Graphics: Ruth Schloegl, Roman Richter, page 20: Nele Prinz / No Plastic Challenge & Steffen Kraft / kraft&adelImages: Front page: © Jasmin Becela | page 8: © www.plasticgarbageproject.org, Museum für Gestaltung Zurich (c) ZHdK | page 16: © Ralph Schill © WDC 2017

All rights reserved.

WDC is a registered charity, No 1014795 and a company limited by guarantee. Registered in England No 2737421.

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