Volunteers needed!
‘Nature Youth Camp and the 1,000 Trees Campaign’
May 2013
Nhongkhai Province
Background information:
The “Nature Youth Camp” is part of the “Climate Change School Tour”. During the Climate Change School Tour from Febuary – March 2013, the Gaia School Asia and NextGEN Thailand team, taught about climate change and nature to 650 students in 7 schools in the Nong Khai area, Thailand. (See slideshows of our sessions and campaign here : http://gaiaschoolasia.com/
When we asked the kids what solutions they could think of to respond to climate change all of them came up with planting trees. As a result of this overall consensus amongst the youth that planting trees is one of the much needed solutions, we decided to start the “1000 Trees Campaign”. This campaign aims to plant a 1000 trees in the Nongh Khai area, Thailand, with the children we taught at the schools. The children are very excited about it. They helped us in collecting tree seeds on their school grounds resulting in thousands of tree seeds. Some children have already been involved in planting these tree seeds and we have established one tree nursery in the Suai Lhong village for this purpose. The “Nature Youth Camp” is part of the strategies of the “1,000 Trees Campaign”.
· Nature Youth Camp
The “Nature Youth Camp” will be a 10 days camp, from the 1st to the 10th of May, 2013, for the children of primary school of Ban Suai Lhong village in the Nongh Khai province, northeastern region of Thailand. The “Nature Youth Camp” will teach children in a fun and participatory way about nature emphasizing on life of trees, forest ecosystem, how nature(or Gaia) grow a forest, reforestation, how we can help nature to create a forest and what it needs to taking care of trees. It will include theory, hands on work, field trips to forests and many games related to nature and forests.
We are supported and are collaborating with the local Suailhong school, the people from Suailhong village and the local government and the Provincial Government. The children will be highly involved in the process and they will be given responsibility over this area where they are going to plant lots of trees.
Daily schedule of the camp:
8.30 – 11.30 am : morning session (Learning about trees, forest, reforestation, food forest etc)
11.30 – 15.00 am : break
15.00 – 15.30 pm : fun games with kids
15.30 – 17.30 pm : tree planting (planting, mulching, staking, sign making, fencing)
17.30 – 19.00 pm : break
19.00 – 20.00 pm : evening session (showing video on nature, cultural exchange, storytelling from the village elders)
The camp will be held on the school grounds and we will be able to use their facilities.
· Kids in other schools we’ve taught
A few days after this “Nature Youth Camp”, the schools will start their new semester and we will revisit the different schools and students that we have taught and they helped collecting tree seeds for the campaign during the “Climate Change School Tour. We will revisit them and report back to them what we’ve done since we left them and share with them about the Nature Youth Camp.As part of “1,000 tree campaign” we will give each student, who are committed to plant and take care of trees, a young tree for them to plant out in their own land/garden.
· More trees planting at Gaia Ashram
During the same time (12th – 25th of May), we will be planting trees on our land of 2 hectors where we are building the Gaia Ashram. Here it will be the center of Gaia School Asia and the learning center for the local youth.
Support and have fun with us:
1. Volunteer with us: join our camp, have fun with the kids, plant trees in the village, empower the kids, make them feel supported for such great work they commit to do.
2. Donate for food, materials (trees nursery material), transportation and other expenses during the camp and the rest of the 1,000 trees campaign.
For more information and to support us visit: www.gaiaschoolasia.com
Contact us: gaiaschoolasia@gmail.com
Om Sunisa Jamwiset and Tom Deiters
Gaia School Asia and NextGEN Thailand
Let’s allow Gaia to reforest herself
Through our hearts and hands..
