Six months ago, a visit from the team at Banish sparked participatory and inquiry-based plastics education among the children and educators at the ‘Little School on the Roof’. Banish is a Sydney-based, certified social enterprise with a clear mission on sustainability: to make it easier, more accessible, and impactful through solutions grounded in education, action and accountability. Through its Banish Recycling and Diversion (BRAD) Program, Banish works to recycle hard-to-recycle items that cannot be placed in the yellow kerbside bin, affording ‘waste’ a second life. One of Banish’s core beliefs is that education is the key to driving real environmental impact. Indeed, in the six months since engaging in and with Banish, we have found that combining collaborative education with plastic–child encounters results in meaningful action for our community and planet. What has emerged from plastic–child encounters has gone far beyond what we may have imagined, with children becoming agents of, but also with, plastic-knowledge.
The Banish incursion helped us recognise that many of the plastic-based items we place into our yellow kerbside recycling bins cannot be and so are not recycled. As we learnt more about these hard-to-recycle items and their environmental impacts, the children expressed concern whilst also acknowledging that they/we (children, educators, families and community) have a responsibility to reconsider our choices and our ‘trash’ practice(s). And so began a shift in practice from ‘putting it all in the yellow bin’ to diverting items through the ‘Banish bin’
Ever since the Banish visit, plastic–child entanglements have weaved through and knotted with playful lines of learning inquiry and environmental engagements with the children from across all age groups. Plastic bottle tops, soy sauce fish and disposable coffee cups have become key, more-than-human players and provocateurs, prompting all of us to consider more closely the impacts of these items on the little part of the community we inhabit (Kraft et al., 2022). Aligning with research and posthuman perspectives, we have seen firsthand that matter matters (Osgood & de Rijke, 2025).
Enabling honest encounters between children and plastic has not only contributed to a healthier school environment but has also fostered a sense of community environmental stewardship. What has emerged is an evolving curriculum of community connection, agency, and plastic-activism as children’s plastic-knowledge(s) influences action for positive change. Our eyes have been opened to the rich and varied ‘teaching’ that occurs through multiple ways of thinking-with and being-with plastic. We have come to see these plastic provocateurs, as Osgood (2023) describes, cross disciplinary boundaries, affording children opportunities to both physically interact with ‘unwanted’ material but also consider the complex relationships between plastic and our ecosystem. Plastic has become both teacher and facilitator of inclusive, participatory, inquiry-based learning (Kraft et., al, 2022). Twice a month, we review our little school’s child-made ‘banish box’ brimming with hard-to-recycle items donated by families. Gleefully we gasp, ever surprised by how much ‘banish’ flows from the box, and ready ourselves for sorting, categorising, counting and tallying items. Child–plastic interactions during these mathematical processes highlight that plastics carry important memories and meaning; they open channels for creative communication, connection, and enable understandings of our everyday lives to develop as children recognise plastic items that are familiar to them and question those that are unknown (Kraft et al., 2022).
Through Banish, we are hopeful that children will not have to endure a plastic legacy in terms of negative environmental impact, rather a positive plastic legacy will endure through the multiple ways plastic encounters aid in developing creative, literacy and numeracy skills alongside a sense of environmental justice.
Children’s knowledge formation and connection with and through plastic is now routinely observed as children engage in:
Children’s plastic encounters and entanglements with their environments bring to our attention, as well as the attention of families and local communities, how children can both be advocates for and agents of change. These more-than-human inter-relations have developed in children a sense of environmental activism that has positively influenced their relationships with the world(s) they live in and help shape. What began as a pedagogical practice shift from ‘putting it all in the yellow bin’ to diverting items through the “banish bin” has become a shift in community behaviour. Children’s plastic knowledge has influenced families to reconsider their ways with waste; with children creating their own “Banish bins” at home, which now feed into our community collection. In recent months, our pre-school children have become Banish agents for our little school community, assuming the responsibility for delivering our community collections directly to the Banish Sustainability Hub near Sydney’s Central Station. Welcomed by the Banish team and recognised by them as “environmental agents” the children take steps of circular sustainability, re-connecting with the initial “Why’s” of Banish as well as becoming part of Banish’s “How’s”.
References
Kraftl, P., Hadfield-Hill, S., Jarman, P., Lynch, I., Menzel, A., Till, R., & Walker, A. (2022). Articulating encounters between children and plastics. Childhood, 29(4), 478-494. https://doi.org/10.1177/09075682221100879 (Original work published 2022)
Osgood, J. 2023. Adventures requiring care and recklessness: a playful archive. in: Mazzei, L. and Jackson, A. (ed.) Postfoundational Approaches to Qualitative Inquiry London, UK Routledge. pp. 101-118
de Rijke, V., Osgood, J. Tunnelling Through the Anthropocene: Making Oddkin with a Children’s Picturebook. Child Lit Educ (2025). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10583-025-09639-6
