In cooperation with Mersin Metropolitan Municipality and METU Marine Sciences Institute (DBE), students are given 'Environment, Marine and Climate' trainings. Mersin Metropolitan Municipality Environmental Protection and Control Department, which carries out important studies for the development and settlement of environmental awareness at an early age, provides 'Environment, Sea and Climate' training to students in cooperation with METU DBE. In the trainings given by expert lecturers, research assistants and young researchers of METU Marine Sciences Institute; While it is aimed to raise awareness of the sea in children and to approach them with love, especially to raise and protect marine awareness, it is also aimed to raise awareness on issues such as climate change and human-induced global warming.
Transportation and educational material support is also provided by the Metropolitan.
It is aimed to reach 250 students in the trainings, which will continue until the end of May. Mersin Metropolitan Municipality will provide transportation, food and educational material support throughout the training. The Knowledge and Puzzle Booklet for the Clean Mediterranean is also given as a gift for students to learn while having fun.
children; learning through presentations, experiments and games
Classroom Teacher Elif Çatal, who will provide pedagogical support throughout the education, started the training with the 'Drama Work in Nature', which aims to connect children with nature; From METU Marine Sciences Institute, Dr. Evrim Kalkan Tezcan; It provides information on 'What is the Environment', 'What is the Sea', 'Why the Sea Is Important', 'Marine Biodiversity' and 'Turkish Seas'.
Research Assistant Betül Bitir Soylu gave training on 'Environmental and Marine Pollution'; Research Assistant Begüm Tohumcu; 'Sea Turtle and Nature Conservation Studies', Young Researcher İrem Bekdemir talks about 'Climate Change'.
With the 'Crazy Professor Experiment Show' performed by Naim Yağız Demir, one of the young researchers, children learn some facts about global warming through experimentation.
Endemic plant Sand Lily introduced
Children, who develop their map and direction skills with the orienteering work of young researcher Buse Uyseler, learn while having fun. With the short excursion by the sea, children are provided to see and feel the sea and the beach closely, and an endemic plant, sand lilies, is also introduced.
Research Assistant İrem Yeşim Savaş takes special care of children and answers their questions. At the end of the training, the children learned what they learned; he puts it on paper through pictures, poems, stories or slogans.
Kalkan: “Our aim is to raise environmental, sea and climate awareness”
Working as a researcher at METU Marine Sciences Institute, Dr. Evrim Kalkan stated that they gave the training under the umbrella of the recently established METU KLİM – Middle East Technical University Climate Change and Sustainable Development Application and Research Center. Noting that they had previously conducted training programs for children with the Mersin Metropolitan Municipality Environmental Protection and Control Department, Kalkan said, “After our Climate Center was established, we wanted to come together to raise children's awareness of the environment, sea and climate, to bring them together with science and to touch their lives a little bit. We have done these studies before with Mersin Metropolitan Municipality Environmental Protection and Control Department. We have made a similar cooperation again," he said.
Kalkan, who conveyed the details about the content of the training, said, “First of all, what is the Environment and the Sea? What do sea creatures consist of? We go over information like We added some play to it. We wanted them to learn about the seas and what is in the sea, to play games and to leave a more permanent mark on them. Then we get into the climate issue. We're talking about marine pollution, the litter problem. We adults have not been able to take responsibility and change things, but we want to raise awareness and awareness of this in children and change things at least for future generations.
Kalkan also stated that they want to make education fun with games, “Then we have a fun experiment activity. There's a section on there with 4-5 fun experiments on how chemical reactions are related to global warming. In addition, in order to explain the importance of marine protected areas to children and to raise awareness, we took the sea turtle monitoring study we do every year as a reference here. We provide interactive information on what we do about it, what conservation activities mean, how it works and how it is done. We are closing the day by talking about what the day adds to all of us," he said.
Çabuk: “We plan to train approximately 250 students”
Hacer Çabuk, who works in the Project Unit of the Environmental Protection and Control Department, gave information about the process of the training project and said, “This is a project training we have done jointly with METU Marine Sciences Institute. Here, we aim to educate students on environmental pollution, protection of the sea, recognizing the sea, recognizing sea creatures and preventing sea pollution. Our training will continue until the end of May. We set it to 10 weeks in total. By the end of this process, we plan to have trained approximately 250 students.”
Çabuk, who also explained the support they will give to the students throughout the education as the Metropolitan Municipality, said, “We provide educational materials. We provide transportation for students. We provide food support. As educational materials, we gave the students lab coats, notepads, pencil holders and prepared booklets for them.”
“Nature is our living space”
4th grade student Bade Akgül said that she learned important information in education. Expressing that he will do his best to protect the environment, Akgül said, “Nature is our living space. Just as the seas are the habitat of fish, nature is our habitat. "We cannot live without nature," he said.
“I will warn those who throw garbage on the ground and into the sea”
In the training, 4th grade student Kamil Rüzgar Sınıkçı said, “We learned about the habitats of living things and what they feed on,” and said, “I will warn those who throw garbage on the ground, those who throw it into the sea and those who pollute in order to leave a cleaner life for future generations. “I will clean up the area,” he said.
“I will plant a lot of trees”
Explaining what he learned, Muhammet Efe Yıldırım said, "Today we learned how whales feed, they are mammals, the whale is the largest living thing, and how cartilaginous animals are," adding that he will be more sensitive to nature from now on, "I will plant lots of trees. I will throw my garbage in the trash can," he said.
“We should not discharge wastewater into the sea”
Rıdaham Kızgut, who said that he learned detailed information about sea creatures, said, "We played games, we had a lot of fun", while Yusuf Peker said, "It's going very well. I am very happy today, I had a lot of fun. To protect nature, we should not pollute the environment. We should not release exhausts and polluted air into nature. After what I have learned here, I will apply them without fail.” Almira Laçin said, “We learned information about animals. We played games. We should not throw garbage in nature and we should not discharge wastewater into the sea,” he said.