Improving literacy through biodiversity education

Over the past couple of weeks, our outreach team have been working on tree-related activities aimed at children around the age of eight. We collaborated with the South Central Family Service Centre and their Grade 11 Reading Buddies (local service) to bring a fun and exiting activity for local school children. Their service is helping children on a literacy program become more fluent in English and we took this opportunity to educate local school children about Southeast Asian biodiversity.

To target this audience better, we created a book focused on five tree species that are local to Southeast Asia: Durian (Durio sp), Saga (Adenanthera pavonia), Moringa (Moringa oleiferia), Chengal Pasir (Hopea odorata), and Aquilaria (Aquilaria sinensis). In addition to this, we also created a fill in the blanks activity that was combined with interaction with trees physically present. An important point raised in the planning of these activities was that there should be as much engagement with the children as possible. We planned to deliver on this by having the fill in the blanks activity such that you'd pick up the word, place it, and after finishing a sentence, identify that specific tree by going up and pointing to it.

The kids enjoyed the fill in the blanks activity

The kids really enjoyed learning about the different species in the book and it was great to see them be so focused in completing the activity. It was also good for us to make the Grade 11 students more aware about these trees as well.

We're always looking to expand our outreach further, if you are interested in working with us, please contact us at: rainforestnursery@gapps.uwcsea.edu.sg