It’s pretty impossible for us adults not to be aware of climate change and the crisis we face, but our children might be less aware of it.
And so celebrating Earth Day with some exciting Earth Day projects offers us the perfect opportunity to teach kids about the natural world in a fun way, and get kids interested in helping our planet. Indeed, many parents are now using nature names like ocean names to inspire a love and care for the planet.
Before we start talking about nature walks, art projects and art supplies, what exactly is Earth Day?
Let's dive in!
Table Of Contents
What is Earth Day?
Earth Day is an annual event taking place each year on 22nd April, aiming to bring together over one billion people to “advance sustainability and climate action”. Earth Day itself is the focal point of Earth Month, which takes place throughout April with hundreds of events taking place around the world.
This year, Earth Day’s official theme is 'Planet vs Plastics', focusing efforts to "end plastics for the sake of human and planetary health, demanding a 60% reduction in the production of ALL plastics by 2040".
Activities range from global political lobbying and planting trees, to at-home activities like art projects and games to help raise awareness and teach children why it's so important to keep the Earth clean.
Why it's important to teach kids about Earth Day
While the Earth Day network want to engage governments, businesses and other organisations, Earth Day is also a great opportunity to help our kids learn about planet Earth, environmental issues, and how the climate crisis is changing our world.
Global warming and climate change are very real issues that we face as a global society, and ones that future generations will bear the brunt of as they grow older. There is an overwhelming body of evidence to show that the climate crisis is only going to worsen in the decades to come.
Earth Day exists to engage and mobilise the masses, bringing environmental issues to the forefront of the most people possible.
Organisers spread the following message as we celebrate Earth Day:
“As an individual, you yield real power for change through your influence as a consumer, a voter, and a community member. Don’t underestimate your power. When your voice and actions are united with millions of others around the world, we can create an inclusive and impactful movement that is impossible to ignore.”
And as Greta Thunberg put it: “People are underestimating the force of angry kids.”
Fun Earth Day activities for kids
We’ve pulled together a list of 25 amazing Earth Day activities for kids of all ages to help you teach them about planet Earth, and inspire them to care about the environment all year round.
Of course, the best way to celebrate Earth Day is to get outside and interact with nature. But sometimes the weather doesn’t play ball and so we’ve got plenty of Earth Day crafts activities for you too.
Earth Day activities for preschoolers
Earth Day activities for preschool children are all about two things: Interacting with nature and fun, whether it's getting out in the natural world or an Earth Day craft.
1. Visit the local park
Visiting the local park is probably the easiest and most accessible of Earth Day activities for everyone to enjoy, whether it’s getting out in the fresh air or visiting the playground.
2. Go on a nature walk
Nature walks are a step up from just a simple walk to the park. Make a list of different elements of nature for them to spot like birds, local flora and fauna, trees, wildlife and so on.
Local authorities and tourism websites are great for telling you what sort of nature you can expect to find in your area, and might already have dedicated trails or handouts for you to use on your nature walk.
3. Plan a nature scavenger hunt
Another step up on the nature walk, a scavenger hunt challenges the children to not only find but collect different things from nature - it might be different types of native plants, leaves, twigs and sticks, rocks and other items. Kids love scavenger hunts!
Again, local tourism websites might already have resources for this.
4. Go for a picnic
If you want something a little less active, you can always take a picnic to the park or a local picnic spot. To make it a special Earth Day picnic, you could ask your child to help you pick out things to take, focusing on natural fruits and vegetables instead of processed snacks.
5. Earth Day colouring
After your visit to the park, you can continue the celebrations with some Earth Day colouring. There are hundreds of free, printable resources available online for people of all ages, but we particularly like these options for younger children from Crayola.
6. Make salt dough ornaments
Image: Little Bins for Little Hands
Salt dough ornaments are a really fun Earth Day craft; they’re really easy to do, and they last for ages, too. You could make them look like the Earth or something else associated with Earth Day.
They do take 1-2 days to dry, so you could either start them on Earth Day to finish a day or two later, or make a start a couple of days before so that you can finish them off on Earth Day.
7. Mason jar planters
Image: Momtastic
Another brilliant Earth Day craft, making planters out of mason jars are a great way to reuse and recycle the jars you would otherwise throw away.
You can use them for herbs to be used in cooking, or flowers and plants for decoration. I’d also recommend doing a combination of ready-to-pot plants and seeds so that your little one will have something finished on Earth Day, but also get to watch their plants grow in the days and weeks to come.
Earth Day activities for school children
When it comes to Earth Day activities for school children, you can obviously step it up a notch in terms of difficulty but also what you’re teaching them. It's a chance to start teaching kids about the world's natural resources, get the kids involved in activities by using recycled materials.
8. Make a bird feeder
Making a bird feeder is one of my favourite Earth Day activities - even if you don’t get many birds in your garden, making it's is a great way to encourage more into the garden.
There are tonnes of different ways to make a feeder, but we’ve gone with an option that helps you to recycle, suggested by the RSPB.
9. Make a bug hotel
Photo © Garry Knight
We’ve done something for the birds, now it’s time to do something for the bugs! Bug hotels can vary in size, but can be made entirely from things you might have lying around the garden, shed or garage already.
There are loads of different ways to make a bug hotel, but the Wildlife Trust has a brilliant guide on how to make a bug hotel. It's another chance to make use of recycled materials. Don’t worry if you don’t have everything - like bricks, for example - there are plenty of ways to adapt and get around the gap.
10. Coffee filter Earth painting
Image: Darcy and Brian
If you’ve got coffee filters sitting in a cupboard, they’re a great way of making an Earth Day art project. This one comes from family craft experts Darcy and Brian, so here's their step-by-step guide to help you out.
11. Watch a nature documentary
If the weather isn’t your friend or you just want to spend a bit of the day indoors, you can always watch a nature documentary to celebrate Earth Day.
There are loads of great choices out there, especially on the streaming services. On Disney+, you have National Geographic which has entire sections dedicated to animals and nature, climate change, and kids. But my personal favourite is David Attenborough’s Our Planet on Netflix.
If you have younger children, just be careful to check the age ratings as some might contain graphic images. Speaking of younger audiences, Cbeebies has some brilliant shows for those with short attention spans including Down on the Farm, Let’s Go for a Walk and Ranger Hamza’s Eco Quest.
12. Make a vegetable garden
Making your own vegetable garden is not only great fun, it’s incredible rewarding and helps to teach kids about where food comes from - remember this story from 2013 that claimed children in the UK really don’t know where food comes from!? A quarter though FISH fingers come from chicken or pigs!!!
13. Make your own compost heap
Image: RSPB
Making your own compost heap is not only a great way to make use of your garden and food waste, it also provides a wonderful ecosystem for animals and insects like worms and woodlice.
And what’s more, this time next year, you could use your own compost instead of buying it from a store!
The RSPB has another great guide on this here.
14. Plant wildflowers
Planting wildflowers is a great way to not only make your garden look wonderful, but also help local bees and insects.
The WWF has an excellent guide on planting wildflowers, whether it’s your whole garden, in a window box, a hanging basket, or you live in a flat.
15. Teach them how to recycle
If you haven’t already, Earth Day is a great time to teach your kids how to recycle everyday items around the house. You can show them what can and can’t be recycled and turn it into a game, challenging them to put different items into the corresponding recycling bin.
16. Polluted celery experiment
Image: The Bear and The Fox
The chances are your child already knows what pollution it, but this science experiment is a fascinating way to help them understand and visualise water pollution specifically.
17. Oil spill experiment
One way that our waters become polluted is through oil spills, and there’s another great science experiment to help children understand how devastating oil spills can be.
You could even combine this with the celery experiment.
Earth Day activities for tweens and teens
As your child gets older, you can be a bit more honest about the gravity of climate change and the importance of Earth Day. Activities might be a little less "fun" and a bit more impactful. But these activities could also be important steps in changing not only your child's behaviours and attitudes towards the planet, but yours too.
18. Make an Earth Day pledge
By this age, your child is probably already aware they have a responsibility around the house but also to help the environment. So, making an Earth Day pledge is a great way to get them to commit to action all year round. It’s something you can do as an entire family, and make individual pledges. Some pledges you could take might be:
- Reducing or even eliminating single use plastic at home
- Switching electrical appliances off at the plug, rather than leaving them on standby
- Shop at local grocery stores that source their produce from local suppliers
- Use public transport more often
- Spend more time outside as a family
There are plenty of things you could pledge, just make sure that it’s personal and achievable to you and your family
19. Go on a beach clean
One of Earth Day’s most loved and common activities are organised beach cleans. Plastic and garbage are a huge plight for beaches around the world, so beach cleans are a great way to help improve the environment and quality of your local beach but also a brilliant way to spend time outdoors in nature.
It doesn’t have to be an organised event, though. You can do it on your own too, you’ll just need some litter picker and rubbish bags.
20. Go on a hike
Earth Day isn’t just about taking action to improve the environment, it’s also about connecting (or reconnecting) with nature. Going on a hike is one of the best ways to do that with tweens and teens. Whether it’s a canal, a forest or hills and mountains in national parks, hiking with kids is a cracking Earth Day activity.
If you have to travel to your destination, try to use public transport to reduce your environmental impact.
21. Go camping
You could combine your hike with some camping! It’s the ideal way to extend your Earth Day activities and make the most of your time in nature. There are plenty of ways to camp, from pods and cabins to campervans, but we definitely recommend camping in tents to get the best experience for Earth Day.
22. Watch the sunrise or sunset
Another activity you could combine with a hike or camping trip is watching the sunrise or sunset! There’s nothing quite like watching a sunrise or sunset with your family, especially when you’re doing it out in nature.
23. Visit a local farmers’ market
Farmers’ markets are brilliant for so many reasons - they encourage people to shop local which reduces the environmental impact of our food shopping, the quality of the food is usually incredible, and they can also help children to understand where food comes from and how its made - the farmers are usually the ones on the stands, selling their produce so can tell you first-hand how they make it.
24. Visit a zero waste store
Zero waste stores are becoming increasingly popular and common in towns and cities around the world. They encourage people to shop - you guessed it - without waste, whether it’s for food and household items like cleaning products or clothing and grooming products.
25. Go shopping for vintage clothes
The rise of online shopping means that fast fashion has become a huge contributor to global emissions. And so many people around the world have been able to balance wanting to look good with their environmental concerns by shopping in vintage and second hand stores. Rather than buying brand new, buying vintage or second hand clothes reduces the environmental impact and can also be very fashionable, too.
And finally, whatever age your child is… Join a local Earth Day event!
There are hundreds and hundreds of registered Earth Day events taking place around the world in the run-up and on the day itself. Take a look at the Earth Day Events map to see what’s going on near you.
Earth Day history
Now that you're armed with some amazing Earth Day activities for kids, let's take a look at why we are celebrating Earth Day and how it started.
The first Earth Day took place on 22 April 1970 in the US after a junior senator from Wisconsin named Gaylord Nelson became increasingly concerned about the treatment of the environment in the US.
He wanted to harness the strength of the anti-war protests among students across the nation and direct it towards environmental matters. Senator Nelson recruited fellow politicians and a young activist named Denis Hayes to lead the effort to engage campuses across America.
By the end of 1970, Earth Day had prompted the creation of the US Environmental Protection Agency. It also inspired a whole host of other legislation in the following years including the National Environmental Education Act, the Clean Air Act, Clean Water Act, and Endangered Species Act.
In 1990, Earth Day become a global event, engaging more than 200 million across more than 140 countries. Now, Earth Day is believed to be the largest non-religious movement in the world, with onver one billion people taking action to help the environment every year.
FAQs
Is Earth Day the same as World Environment Day?
No, World Environment Day takes place on 5 June every year. While Earth Day is recognised by the United Nations, World Environment Day is organised by the UN. Earth Day and World Environment Day have very similar messages and goals
Who created Earth Day?
Senator Gaylord Nelson from Wisconsin created Earth Day, with the support of young activist Denis Hayes.
Is Earth Day always on 22 April?
Yes, we always celebrate Earth Day on 22 April, regardless of what day it falls on, ever since the first one in 1970.
What are good Earth Day activities for kids?
Earth Day is all about connecting with nature and taking action to protect our planet, and so anything that helps children to get outside and interact with nature make for great Earth Day activities. The weather sometimes means we can’t get outside, but that doesn’t mean that we can’t do some great Earth Day activities indoors - anything that teaches kids about our planet and why it needs protecting is a good one.
How do you explain Earth Day to children?
The answer to this largely depends on how old your child is. The older they are, the more you can refer to the dangers of climate change and point out things like statistics. But younger children will naturally be more engaged by language relating to ‘looking after our planet’. Even younger children will already be aware of days of significance, and so explaining Earth Day itself should be pretty straightforward.
How many people take part in Earth Day?
Organisers earthday.org estimate more than one billion people take some sort of action as part of Earth Day every year.
