• An Eco brick is a plastic PET bottle that is densely packed with used unrecyclable plastic to create a reusable building block. Each brick is stuffed with the plastic, and we use a sturdy stick (wooden spoon) to compact the soft plastic into the bottle. Once the bottle is completely full it will be as hard as a rock with NO air spaces and holds an estimated 1 to 2 pounds of plastic. What is unrecyclable plastic? It’s the plastics we accumulate that are not recyclable in our collection bins. Things like white amazon bags, chip bags, bread bags, shopping bags, snack wrappers, balloons and the list goes on.  To help visually understand how to make one I attached a little poster. I included a photo of some of the bricks too.

    Eco Bricks can and are used to produce various items, including, furniture, and even walls for homes. Shirley sent out a video at the beginning of the year about a community that built a school with them! They are the perfect building block because the compact plastic works as a perfect insulator for cooler climates.

    For this year I have taught the Eco bricking lesson to our 5th and 6th grade students. Not only how to build them but why building them is a great environmental task. The lesson has helped to encourage our students, collectively be aware and responsible for of the amount of unrecyclable plastic we accumulate in our everyday lives. In fact most of the classroom now save their snack trash for the bricks, essentially eliminating extra garbage. I track the amount of trash that is saved with each brick that is made so we can see with numbers how much of an impact we are making. I have also encouraged the students to sort their plastics at home and bring it in. This also is a great eye opener to see how much unrecyclable plastic you create our homes.

    Our plans for the bricks will be some garden/pathway edging and if we have enough our students will build some little side projects as a surprise for the school. In the last few months, our students have made 121 Eco Bricks!!! That means they have saved an estimated 100+ pounds of trash from landfills or waterways. If you pass my class and peek in you will see the bricks lined up in my window and counter.  It’s an impressive sight!

    I encourage you to try this experiment, sort your plastics at home or in your classrooms. You will be surprised just how much trash we create that is not recyclable! I will welcome any that you collect for our students to finish the remaining bottles for our planned projects.