Baisha Elementary students clean up beaches and create art from marine debris; principal urges children of a fishing village to be grateful to the sea

Little Liuqiu is committed to protecting the marine and coastal ecological environment. Since 2013, it has implemented a policy banning gillnets within 3 nautical miles of the coast to protect safe breeding habitats for fish in coastal and offshore waters. Beach cleanups are also held in an endless stream every year, and besides enthusiastic participation by residents, the effort has extended to educating the next generation.

This semester, Baisha Elementary invited Lin Pei-yu, founder of "Beach Currency," to lead the children in "learning by doing," using collected marine debris materials to create jellyfish ornaments, painted buoys, and three-dimensional canoes, stimulating students to think about the relationship between people and the ocean. The children unleashed their imaginations, creating one piece of ocean art after another from marine debris, astonishing teachers and parents alike.

"Little Liuqiu has only one junior high school and no senior high school, which means that if a 15-year-old child wants to continue their education, they must return to the main island of (Taiwan). So only by cultivating a sense of identity with their hometown when they are young will they want to come back when they grow up." Baisha Elementary principal Tian Yong-cheng hopes that the children of Little Liuqiu can be like "sea turtles," willing to "return to the sea" and come home, and possess the character of "sea rules" and the literacy of ocean culture, so that Little Liuqiu's environment and industries can develop sustainably.

Turning the fate of marine debris around - super fun teaching materials!

When the bell for the first afternoon class rang, it was expected that the children, having just eaten lunch and feeling sleepy, might arrive late. Unexpectedly, they came rushing into the classroom full of energy, eager to begin the art class they look forward to most each week. "Come on! Today we're going to make jellyfish ornaments!" Lin Pei-yu, founder of Little Liuqiu Beach Currency, has served as the art teacher for Baisha Elementary's fourth through sixth graders since this semester, leading the children to start with beach cleanups, learn about marine litter, and begin learning to create from marine debris, creatively promoting the concept of ocean education.

Torn raincoats collected from store trash bins and gas stations are transformed into colorful translucent jellyfish dolls; discarded buoys become animals, schools of fish, and even rockets and shells after being painted. All kinds of discarded items are "brought back to life" in the Baisha Elementary classroom, turning around the fate of trash and inspiring students' limitless creative possibilities.

Lin Pei-yu pointed out that convenient plastic raincoats are often used only once and are casually discarded after they develop holes or get soaked by rain. "The duty-free shop is tourists' last stop, and it accumulates a large number of discarded raincoats. I first collect them all and dry them, sort out the ones that can still be worn, and use the badly torn ones as creative materials, so they are no longer single-use items."

The children treated the old raincoats as treasures, concentrating on folding out jellyfish shapes. "You have to tear the bottom into strips, that way it feels like the jellyfish is swimming!" During the craft process, they tried to imagine the appearance of aquatic animals. "This is a squid, right!" "I think it looks more like a fine-weather doll!" The rising and falling chatter told the stories of the ocean in their hearts.

Marine debris becomes brittle and harder to clean up; buoys litter the coast and pollute the environment

In addition, buoys from China can often be picked up along the coast of Little Liuqiu. After fishermen haul in their nets, many broken fishing gear are left on the seabed, and the buoys used to keep the gear fixed on the surface also drift around with ocean currents, eventually accumulating in Taiwan's coastal and offshore waters. The well-known Zhejiang floats can be seen on the beaches of the offshore islands of Penghu and Liuqiu.

"The most common things found in beach cleanups are plastic bottles, buoys, styrofoam and plastic fragments. Over time they become brittle (that is, under the beating of waves and friction with sand and stones, plastic fragments become smaller and smaller, until they are even hard to see with the naked eye), and then they become harder to clean up, and may also be eaten by animals by mistake or even trap them." Lin Pei-yu seriously explained the origins of each kind of marine debris, explaining how plastic pollutes the ocean, accumulates in the environment, and comes back to affect people's lives and health.

"I want to draw a bluefin tuna!" "I want to paint it as a red rocket!" After being washed clean, discarded buoys likewise become creative materials, serving as canvases for the children's doodles. Everyone racked their brains hoping to paint a one-of-a-kind souvenir, and even ignored the end-of-class bell, enjoying it immensely.

However, because buoys may leach heavy metal lead into seawater and pollute the environment, Lin Pei-yu always reminds students to wash their hands thoroughly after touching buoys before eating.

"I eat jellyfish, you eat plastic" - childlike creations show ocean conservation awareness

Island nations live by the sea. Ocean currents bring endless vitality, and at the same time also push back onto land the garbage created by humans. Marine debris makes us reflect on the relationship between people and the ocean, and in children's hands, inconspicuous marine debris plus imagination creates one lifelike artwork after another.

"Actually, the stories you tell them will all be buried deep in their hearts, including sea turtles trapped by fishing nets, fish accidentally eating plastic, and the sea bringing in garbage." Baisha Elementary principal Tian Yong-cheng pointed to the row at the back of the classroom, the three-dimensional marine debris works just completed by the fifth and sixth graders.

A "garbage fountain" made of plastic fragments and styrofoam surrounds a whale completely, and the student sadly explained: "Because the whale ate garbage, what it spouts is all garbage." Another student used fishing line to make a tangled mass of fishing net, describing the suffering of sea turtles he saw in a video; another student even wrote directly on a painting, "I eat jellyfish, do you want to eat plastic?"

"This is what I told them in the first class. The current crises facing the ocean touched them, and they remembered it, so it becomes creative inspiration. At the same time, they also start from daily life, actively bringing water bottles, and even suggesting that family members not use disposable plastic bags." Lin Pei-yu praised every student as a super artist, saying that each marine debris work full of sincere childlike innocence is in fact a profound creation responding to environmental awareness.

In addition, some students used buoys to make canoes, pieced together driftwood into buildings, and broke free from the framework of ocean backgrounds, trying to create plate after plate of delicious dishes. One student who is lively and active in other classes