When you have experienced something you appreciate it. True for Namibians experiencing their natural environment, the land and all its inhabitants in which we were born. With the pace of development around the world many children today do not experience the wild nature and how, as humans beings, to coexist with the environment in a way that does not do damage.
In the Otjozondjupa Region, mining company B2Gold have established an education centre at their Otjikoto Mine where children from the region attend environmental education camps. Here conservation of the natural environment is demonstrated and experienced. 99FM’s MYD Earth travelled to B2Gold’s Education Centre in the Otjozondjupa Region, where children are taught about why indigenous trees are better to have in Namibia. A main reason being that they lose less water than other trees. This is demonstrated by capturing water in plastic bags tied to different types of trees to see how much water escaped by the amount of water left in the bag overnight.
Fully equipped science laboratories have been built at the education centre that mean when children attend one of the camps there they have the opportunity to explore the science behind nature in these laboratories. Living within and learning about nature in a fun and educational style, this program has brought opportunities to schools who might not have had such exposure.
More recently the centre partnered with an American University’s Little Shop of Physics which saw science teachers from all over the Otjozondjupa Region attend physics and natural science workshops, in their December holiday time. A demonstration of passion for your trade and your students, these teachers now are better equipped to share the wonder of science with young and curious minds. What’s more, each teacher that attended the workshop, received physics equipment to take back to their school to continue to empower their students with. Equipment which they have been trained to teach the Namibian physics curriculum on.
Brian Jones from the Colorado State University’s Little Shop of Physics says that “the enthusiasm and cooperation of the teachers in Namibia is unparalleled and the experience has been nothing short of humbling and educating”. Meaning that the enthusiasm for such projects is high among the children attending the camps in the Namibian bush as well as it is for the teachers that carry the message of conservation and understanding of our world, long after the camp has ended.