Tell Recycle Now how you encourage your DCs to recycle for a chance to win an iPad mini! NOW CLOSED

[AnnMumsnet]

We are all aware of the importance of recycling, but it can be easy to forget when we’re all so busy browsing MN threads. Recycle Now has teamed up with Wastebuster to launch a campaign to encourage more families to recycle more items, more often. They would like to hear how you encourage your DCs to recycle and for you to take part in their Home Recycling Challenge.

Here’s what Recycle Now has to say: “To help kids recycle more at home, we’ve created the Home Recycling Challenge, which includes the chance to win great prizes. Here’s how you and your family can take part:

Step 1 – visit wastebuster.co.uk/homerecyclingchallenge and download the competition sheet/ recycling poster template

Step 2 – use the recycling locator with your kids to find out what can and can’t be recycled in your area and use this information to fill in the blanks and decorate on your poster

Step 3 – stick the poster up in your home and take a family selfie

Step 4 – upload your photo to the Recycling Hero Hall of Fame to be in with a shot of winning some great prizes!

Every family has a different routine, and we want to hear about how you teach your kids good recycling habits that they can take forward into later life. Did you know that you can recycle bleach bottles, shampoo bottles, kitchen cleaner bottles, baby food jars, aerosol deodorants, face cream pots and dishwasher tablet boxes?”

Have a look at their video here

So how do you get your DC to recycle at home? Maybe you make a game of it by seeing who can recycle the most? Perhaps you make it easier to sort by having stickered bins? Do you take it in turns or is it one person’s job? Or do you give your DC rewards for recycling?

Please share on this thread how you encourage your DCs to recycle below and you will be entered into the prize draw to where one winner will win an iPad mini.

Thanks and good luck!

MNHQ

Standard Insight T and Cs Apply

DD tends to repurpose rather than recycle. Anything even slightly interesting gets taken to be part of an art project.

She does help me take the recycling out to the bin and wheels it out to the kerb. And she's watched the recycling episode of Finley the Fire Engine about 50 times

We have general waste and general recycling bins in the house, outdoor glass bin, compost heap and small garden incinerator.

DS is six, so I quite often give him the recycling to wash up, but he also regularly raids it for craft activities.

We garden a lot, so he's very used to putting things on the compost, including food waste.

It's not hard to motivate him to get involved. It's part of our day to day life and they also teach the three Rs at school.

DS has heard me rant (more than once) about the lack of recycling bins in coffee shops or public spaces!

I really wish private households and business were charged for general waste and recycling was free. If we really want to effect change, that, imho, is the best way forward.

Way of life, knowing which bin inside or out the rubbish goes into

right from tiny, they have seen us putting the different things to be recycled in different places, and it is 2nd nature to them now

We have no problem as kids seem to be growing up in a time when it is second nature to recycle. Our son will often point out our mistakes!

We have a picture of a recycling monster on the front of our bin and the children love feeding him all our recycing items, he is like a family pet.

We try and make it fun by turning it into a game, my little one also likes collecting recyclable objects to use for her art work

My LO tells ME to recycle and save water. He has made his own recycle list so that I know what to recycle!

Location is key! If it's easy they're more likely to do it! I put a little black bin in my sons bedroom for recycling paper as he loves to draw and gets through lots!

We have always recycled as a family. We wash everything out and put it in the colour coded recycling bags and then take it out to the garage to put in the larger recycling bins. My children enjoy doing this as we do it tk improve our environment and to lesson the amount of waste going to landfill. We have done this for so long now it is just a way of life for us.

We have a yellow bin for general rubbish, a silver bin for plastics and paper/cardboard/glass and a little green bin for food waste and a small worktop caddy for food waste too. DD is 6 and without us teaching her explicitly, always asks or confirms which bin to use for what rubbish. We live between 2 houses both within different councils which recycle differently and have different coloured bins, so we have to be extra vigilant to get it right. I agree with posters up thread that children need little encouragement these days as they are more attuned to it. Mind you, there's always a certain thrill to recycling glass bottles and listening to the smash! Just a shame so many recycling points won't let children out of cars to help as it is hardly encouraging.

i'm an avid recycler and my kids are pretty good with it, ive initiated it into their chores for pocket money. I think its really important to get the kids on board as this is for their future

I always tell them why and what I'm doing so that they want to help with it

We get them to take the recycling out each day

we try to make a game of who can find the most pieces of rubbish that we can recycle

My DD1(5yo) is on board with recycling, she always checks where things go before binning them. I think young kids have just grown up with it. It's a bit boring, but talking about why we recycle seems to be sufficient to reinforce it!

My kids are already well trained and separate food waste, plastics/ glass, paper etc without really thinking about it. It's normal
behaviour for them to recycle.

reward charts

It is something they have always done - we have a bin for general household rubbish and one for paper, tins, bottles etc and a compost bin at the bottom of the garden for waste food
Jars tend to be kept in our house for the purpose of filling them with home-made jams and preserves and tubs from margarine make good water containers for the kids to use when they are painting

Dd (2) isn't normally allowed in the kitchen, which therefore makes it a place of great excitement and intrigue. We let her go in to put recycling in the kitchen recycling box. This is apparently a really fun and exciting treat for her followed by lots of smiles and giggles. Hopefully she'll keep this positive feeling towards recycling :-)

I reward their recycling efforts with a few sweets. They seem to enjoy separating the items.

We are really big on recycling in our house. Our Council collects all recycling items in one bin rather than seperated which does make it easier.

I like to upcycle any items I can and ive just taught my daughter to sew so she can start doing the same.

I always donate any items that we won't use to charity shops or on freecycle and when looking for new items I often check out charity shops first... i got my daughter a fab pair of converse pumps from our local charity shop for £3 last week!

We make it just part of daily life. My 4yo dd already knows what can go in the bin in the kitchen for throwing away and what needs leaving on the side to go into the recycle bin.
She also has learnt what goes in the brown garden waste bin and loves to help.
Her favourite job by far has to be shredding lots of paper and once the recycle bin is full, standing in it to squash it down. Some of the simple things we do like that mean she knows what goes where.

As a family we try and recycle everything possible and include my dd in those discussions. Not onl about sorting things for the correct bin but in giving things away that others can still use but we don't want.

I don't have to turn recycling into a game. I lead by example. My daughter has two bins in her room and she knows what items to put in each. I suppose the closest to a reward is that I then empty them into the main bin for her.

I tell my sons all about the world and how we can make a change, I tell them about wildlife getting stuck on rubbish and why it's so important to recycle, they are really wonderful at doing this and I will continue to learn them