April 22 is Earth Day, and this provides teachers with an opportunity to encourage students to get involved in their own communities! With these free Earth Day printables students will connect writing with environmental concerns.
In honor of our planet, have students in grades 1–12 draw their favorite landscape using vocabulary words.
With these free Earth Day printables students will connect writing with environmental concerns.
To reinforce this idea, students will give brief explanations at the bottom of their worksheet for why they chose the words they did for each object. Sometimes this may be obvious, but by having to repeat the vocabulary word again and justify it in an explanation helps reinforce the meaning (and if it’s not quite right, they can explain their thinking explicitly, so we don’t have to guess).
Finally, there are a number of extension writing ideas you could pair with this activity. Students could write a poem about their landscape using vocabulary words or fill out a What's Your Promise? handout (see below). Download the Earth Day Vocabulary Worksheet now.
The second Earth Day printable I'm highlighting is for students in grades K–6. With this worksheet, students will write down a promise they are willing to make on Earth Day to make the planet a better place. Once students have written down their commitments have them color their Earth Day worksheet! Download the What's Your Promise? Earth Day Writing Activity now.
The last free Earth Day printable I have available for download is for students in grades 3–8. I love this exercise because it connects writing, research, classroom collaboration, and environmental concerns!
Using the Opinion Piece Outline Graphic Organizer, teachers will task students with writing an opinion piece on a topic that is of concern to them or they want to learn about to celebrate Earth Day. The opinion piece topics can either stem from events in their community or issues on a more global scale. Possible topics include:
Download the Opinion Piece Outline Graphic Organizer to assist students in their writing.
Use the Growing Grassy Heads Activity to explore plants in your classroom. This fun Earth Day project not only teaches the steps to planting, but can also start a classroom discussion on our responsibility to take care of our earth!
This lesson will engage students in discussions about plant growth factors as well as using their compare and contrast skills. These free printable Earth Day worksheets will outline everything teachers need to implement this lesson in the classroom.
After planting, students will keep a Grassy Head Journal to record observations and the growth of the seeds. In their journal, students can include pictures of the cup and grass, track the height of the grass, and write sentences describing the growth of the grass. Additionally, with this Earth Day-inspired project students will participate in a Plant Comparison Writing Activity.
Finally, use the Growing Grassy Heads Activity to introduce other Earth Day themes. Why are plants important to sustaining life? How does pollution impact plant life? Why do we recycle? How can we protect the Bee population and why is it important?
Hopefully, the free Earth Day printables above will help your students celebrate our amazing planet on April 22. These Earth Day writing activities may seem silly in comparison to the environmental concerns our planet is facing, but they can have a huge impact on our students.
With these Earth Day writing activities our students will reflect on the importance of taking care of the Earth and will hopefully be inspired to support environmental projects in their own community.