Year 4 discuss the issues arising from deforestation
27th November 2015
This week in English, the children have been reading a lovely book by Lynne Cherry called ‘The Great Kapok Tree’ which puts forward the issues and dilemmas arising from deforestation. The have realised that nothing is ever simply black and white! Every issue raised has a counter argument and this generates a dilemma. This linked perfectly with the work in topic where they discussed the causes of deforestation; logging, mining, farming and damming.
In groups, the children discussed a picture showing one of these causes and then presented their ideas to the class. They took their ideas and created a ‘conscience alley’ where each child took on a character and walked slowly along the alley as the other children whispered their opinions and advice. At the end the child in character had to make a decision -to chop or not to chop!
We have discussed how deforestation is linked to climate change and the effect rising sea levels are having in countries such as Bangladesh and Kiribati which have both been in the news this week.