EcoBrick Exchange built a proudly South African spot with the help of little volunteers

The EcoBrick Exchange teamed up with a primary school from Port Elizabeth to build a Heritage Day feature at a local community centre.

Where we can’t stop the use of all plastics, we can combat their use by creating EcoBricks which can be used to build any type of building structure imaginable.

An Eco Brick is made up of a large 2l (coke shaped) plastic bottle which is packed full of un-recyclable material like sweet wrappers, straws and chip packets. This method represents a zero waste system and greatly reduces the waste ending up in landfills. The bricks are well-insulated and resistant to earthquakes.

Each brick then becomes the building block with a greater purpose. Recently the EcoBrick Exchange teamed up with a pre-primary school in Port Elizabeth and the Khaya Volunteers Project to build a proudly South African outdoor area at a local community centre.

The focus was on filling colour-coded bottles to represent the colours of the South African flag.

“What started as a Heritage Day inter-class competition yielded a variety of EcoBrick colour pixels representing our flag’s 6 colours. This took teamwork, sorting the plastic into colours and much assistance from teachers and parents. An important step in the process was to start off each colour bottom at school (with some adult supervision) and then for the remainder of the brick to be completed at home. This way the family could all be involved and classroom remained a teaching space (ie not interrupted by EcoBricking).

Each time a student brought in a completed EcoBrick he/she received a matching coloured sticker and the duty of adding it to the flag chart within the school’s entrance. This system worked so well that the students achieved the 234 EcoBricks in a mere 6 week period.”

Once they had collected enough EcoBricks, the Khaya Volunteer Project got busy working and built a heritage day spot at a local community centre. The work done by all people involved was incredible. Take a look at the finished flag below.

Sources: Facebook

Have something to add to this story? Share it in the comments or follow GoodThingsGuy on Facebook & Twitter to keep up to date with good news as it happens.

Click the link below to listen to the Good Things Guy Podcast, with Brent Lindeque – South Africa’s very own Good Things Guy. He’s on a mission to change what the world pays attention to and he truly believes that there’s good news all around us. In the Good Things Guy podcast, you’ll meet these everyday heroes & hear their incredible stories:

Or watch an episode of Good Things TV below, a show created to offer South Africans balance in a world with what feels like constant bad news. We’re here to remind you that there are still so many good things happening in South Africa & we’ll hopefully leave you feeling a little more proudly South African.

by Tyler Leigh Vivier

0Shares

• 0Shares
  Share
• Tweet
• Share
• Share
• Pin it
• Email
• More