Fiji Hub Achievement Report

February 2018
Caqalai
Environmental Education Outreach

Long Term Objective: Provide the communities of Caqalai and Moturiki with information on
their natural resources, including the threats and means of protection, to empower them to
make the best-informed decisions when looking after their resources.

Mid-term Objective: Environmental Education Outreach at Moturiki District School (MDS)

and Uluibau Primary School (UPS) to inform and empower the next generation to act and
protect their environment.

Introduction
Global Vision International strongly believe in grassroot learning and sharing of information
and knowledge to the younger generations in the society. This enables us to instill in them
information about certain issues affecting our world today. These issues include climate
change, sustainable fishing, healthy living, proper waste management and many more.

Moturiki Island is surrounded by beautiful coral reefs and lustrous green forests. Protecting
these natural resources is important as it will help support the future generations. Gone are
the days when people fished or harvested crops only for subsistence use as they are now
more focused on earning money to put food on the table and meeting their daily needs.
This has placed a huge pressure on the reef whereby people use unsustainable fishing
methods that impacts the whole ecosystem and has caused a lot of disturbed the balance
food web in the oceans.

Educating the young students in schools with issues of today is key in bringing up bright
young leaders of tomorrow who will have the knowledge and the mentality to do what is
right.

Therefore, together with the teachers on the schools in Moturiki, we forged lesson plans
that would inform and educate students on issues that need to be addressed today so that
they do not face problems in the nearby future. These lesson plans include informing
students about the importance of the resources in their community and why it is necessary
to keep them protected.

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Summary
There are 3 school terms each year in the Fiji education system and each term has 14 weeks
of school. We visit the two schools (MDS and UPS) once a week and teach 2-hour classes for
Years 3, 4, 5 and 6 aged between 8 and 11 years old.

Figure 1.1: GVI Volunteer, teaching students of Moturiki District School about human
impacts on the coral reefs.
This year we have tried to tailor the environmental education lesson plans to be more
closely related to the Moturiki community. This includes good hygiene practices, proper
waste management, healthy living, teaching the students about the marine ecosystem, its
importance to their society and how human influence have greatly impacted its survival and
continuity. Most importantly, students get to learn how to use their resources wisely and to
properly manage it for the future generations.

Conclusion
The students we have been teaching have shown great knowledge of climate change and
are now well versed with issues the world is facing today. We have received feedback from
parents that students share their knowledge at home on how to practice good hygiene and
proper waster management. These shows that grassroot learning is very important as
students grow up with these knowledges of sustainable living and helping the community’s
resources to be used in a sustainable manner in the years to come.

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