Children transform refuse into treasure at SCRF 2024

The Sharjah Children’s Reading Festival (SCRF 2024) too has been playing an incredible role in building young consciousnesses with regular workshops at their ‘Go Sustainable pavilion’. On Friday, it hosted a workshop demonstrating how to construct a dwarf house using materials that would otherwise have been discarded as rubbish.

“The turnout for our workshops this season has been fantastic. Even today, I am surprised to see so many children returning to our workshop to make Dwarf House. These boys at the table are so acutely aware of the importance of recycling and reusing. I am impressed,” said Ismail Al Ahmad, a certified instructor, pointing at two 7-year-olds, Hamdan and Ahmed, who were deep into their craft, pasting brown paper on an empty popcorn tub.

Explaining the meaning of recycling, Hamdan said, “It is when we reuse waste to make new things instead of throwing them away and making a big mess on the Earth. We should not buy new things all the time because they come from factories, which produce a lot of CO2, which increases global warming in the atmosphere of the Earth.”

Ahmed nodded in agreement and jumped in to add, “I like the workshop because it is teaching me how to recycle.”

Beyond the educational aspect of the workshop, it also served as a masterclass in refining fine motor skills and fostering teamwork. Children as young as 7 deftly wielded hot glue guns, scissors, cello tape, and craft paper to transform refuse into beautiful knick knacks.

Another 8-year-old girl at the workshop was an enthusiastic participant who not only completed her project quickly but was also helping other girls.

The Go Sustainable section hosts eight workshops every day, designed to impart knowledge to children about the significance of recycling. The 15th edition of the Sharjah Children’s Reading Festival draws to a close on May 12.