My son is 5 y.o. and is responsible for the recycling in the house, so in the interest of a-picture-is-worth-a-1000-words....
We went to the landfill today. At first I thought the guy wasn't going to let us drive in there. At the entrance there's one big metal building and several huge yellow vehicles parked nearby; across the road are about 10 big blue bins stuffed with all manner of trash, from couches to old tires. I gather this is where people are required to dump their loads; we saw one guy with cabinets in the back of his truck waiting to unload. Beyond that are high bare hills on which no trash is visible. I was rather disappointed, but then we drove on a dirt road, after a guy in a big tractor gave us permission. The road makes an enormous circuit around these hills and at the far side we came to the current trash heap. It was probably at least 50 feet high, but I'm a bad judge of height. Turns out all those hills are made of trash. I gather once they're full they put dirt over the top and these black pipes all over -- I suppose to let the gas escape. On the way we also saw an excavated site where it seems they will put the anti-leach basin before starting a new trash pile. We stopped the car on the current hill and hiked to the top. There were two empty tractor-type vehicles that seem to be either for transport or for compacting down the trash. Trash lay all over the hill, just out in the open. Unbelievable what people throw away. DS and I looked over the mound and identified so many things that could have been recycled. The scary thing is that this is very close to one of our major rivers. I'll bet I could have thrown a rock and hit it.
I think, because DS doesn't entirely "get it" yet, we're going to do a biodegradable experiment, where we're going to leave a bunch of stuff outside to see what happens to it: plastic, glass, cardboard, paper, leaves, cloth, that kind of thing. Hopefully this will lead to more understanding (for me and him) why it's best not just to recycle, but to be careful about what we buy in the first place. Has anyone done this? I'd welcome ideas if it's been done before.
We went to the landfill today. At first I thought the guy wasn't going to let us drive in there. At the entrance there's one big metal building and several huge yellow vehicles parked nearby; across the road are about 10 big blue bins stuffed with all manner of trash, from couches to old tires. I gather this is where people are required to dump their loads; we saw one guy with cabinets in the back of his truck waiting to unload. Beyond that are high bare hills on which no trash is visible. I was rather disappointed, but then we drove on a dirt road, after a guy in a big tractor gave us permission. The road makes an enormous circuit around these hills and at the far side we came to the current trash heap. It was probably at least 50 feet high, but I'm a bad judge of height. Turns out all those hills are made of trash. I gather once they're full they put dirt over the top and these black pipes all over -- I suppose to let the gas escape. On the way we also saw an excavated site where it seems they will put the anti-leach basin before starting a new trash pile. We stopped the car on the current hill and hiked to the top. There were two empty tractor-type vehicles that seem to be either for transport or for compacting down the trash. Trash lay all over the hill, just out in the open. Unbelievable what people throw away. DS and I looked over the mound and identified so many things that could have been recycled. The scary thing is that this is very close to one of our major rivers. I'll bet I could have thrown a rock and hit it.
I think, because DS doesn't entirely "get it" yet, we're going to do a biodegradable experiment, where we're going to leave a bunch of stuff outside to see what happens to it: plastic, glass, cardboard, paper, leaves, cloth, that kind of thing. Hopefully this will lead to more understanding (for me and him) why it's best not just to recycle, but to be careful about what we buy in the first place. Has anyone done this? I'd welcome ideas if it's been done before.
I know that for me, the huge shift in reducing, reusing, recyling happened after dh and I made a trip to our local dump. It was incredibly depressing and sobering.
Oh, and dd1 helps us sort out our returnables and scrap metal and she gets to keep a portion of that money. She's only 3 but she loves it! That might be another tool for helping your little one get into the recycling groove... not only is it good for the planet, it can be good for savings accounts too. 
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