Education to nurture kindness in Chinese children

ACTAsia’s Earth Day 2026 Programme: Inspiring the Next Generation to Tackle Microplastic Pollution

At ACTAsia, we believe that education is one of the most powerful tools for creating lasting change. Through our award-winning Caring for Life (CFL) Children’s Education Programme, we help young people develop compassion, responsibility and respect for animals, people and the environment.

In April, ACTAsia celebrated its sixth consecutive Earth Day programme, reaching thousands of teachers and students across China with a focus on one of the most urgent environmental challenges facing our planet today: microplastic pollution. Earth Day provides an opportunity for schools to experience the Caring for Life approach to learning before implementing the full six-year curriculum, while encouraging children to become active participants in protecting their world.

Understanding the Hidden Threat of Microplastics

This year’s Earth Day theme explored the growing problem of microplastics, tiny plastic particles less than five millimetres in size that are now found in oceans, rivers, soil, food chains and even the air we breathe.

Through engaging educational resources and classroom discussions, students learned how plastic pollution impacts ecosystems, wildlife and human health. The programme encouraged children to think critically about their own consumption habits and to consider practical actions they can take to reduce plastic waste in their daily lives.

By helping young people understand the connections between environmental protection, animal welfare and human wellbeing, ACTAsia is nurturing a generation that recognises the importance of compassionate and responsible decision-making.

Engaging Thousands of Teachers

A key component of the Earth Day programme was a national teacher training webinar designed to equip educators with the knowledge and resources needed to deliver the activities effectively.

This year, 6,580 teachers attended or livestreamed the Earth Day training session. During the webinar, teachers were introduced to the microplastics theme, guided through the educational toolkit and provided with practical ideas for classroom implementation.

Teachers were also encouraged to share stories, photographs and videos from their Earth Day activities, helping to build a growing network of educators committed to environmental education and compassionate learning.

Bringing Learning to Life Through Film

One of the highlights of this year’s programme was ACTAsia’s collaboration with Cafeteria Culture, a US-based environmental education organisation behind the acclaimed documentary Microplastics Madness.

The film follows a group of eleven-year-old students in Brooklyn as they investigate the causes and consequences of plastic pollution and work together to create positive change within their community.

ACTAsia supported the project by translating the film into Chinese, making this powerful educational resource accessible to schools throughout China. Students were encouraged to watch the film, discuss its key messages and reflect on how they could contribute to reducing plastic pollution within their own communities.

The film provided an inspiring example of how young people can become environmental leaders and demonstrated that meaningful change can begin with small individual actions.

Interactive Activities that Inspire Action

To reinforce learning and encourage active participation, ACTAsia developed a comprehensive Earth Day teaching toolkit filled with practical and engaging activities.

Students took part in quizzes, case studies and inquiry-based learning exercises designed to help them investigate the causes and consequences of plastic pollution. Hands-on activities included environmental observation games, litter awareness exercises and creative recycling projects that encouraged students to rethink waste and develop more sustainable habits.

Older students were introduced to innovative environmental solutions, including technologies designed to remove plastic pollution from oceans and waterways, helping them understand both the scale of the challenge and the potential solutions available.

These activities transformed environmental education from an abstract concept into a meaningful personal experience, empowering students to see themselves as part of the solution.

Building a More Compassionate Future

The impact of ACTAsia’s Earth Day programme extends far beyond a single day of learning.

By helping children understand the consequences of plastic pollution and encouraging them to make more responsible choices, the programme supports the development of lifelong values of compassion, responsibility and environmental stewardship.

As these children share their learning with families and communities, the benefits ripple outward, creating wider awareness and encouraging positive behavioural change.

We are deeply grateful to GlobalGiving supporters for making this work possible. Your support enables ACTAsia to continue reaching children, teachers and schools with education that not only increases knowledge but also inspires action.

Together, we are helping to build a future where children understand their responsibility to care for animals, people and the planet — creating healthier, kinder and more sustainable communities for generations to come.

ACTAsia’s Caring for Life Children’s Education Programme 

In classrooms across China in 2025, children were encouraged to ask deeper questions: How do my choices affect animals? Why does kindness matter? What responsibility do I have to the world around me?

ACTAsia believes that real change begins early. When children are given the tools to understand compassion, responsibility and interconnectedness, those values shape not only their own lives, but the future of their communities. What children learn at school does not stay in the classroom — it travels home, influences behaviour, and shapes how families and communities relate to animals, people and the planet.

Through its award-winning Caring for Life (CFL) Children’s Education Programme, ACTAsia continued to embed these principles at the heart of education in 2025. The programme supported schools to prioritise empathy, wellbeing and environmental awareness, using education as a powerful tool to build compassion, resilience and long-term social change.

Over the year, ACTAsia reached 9,399 children and trained 1,516 teachers in humane education. Delivered through a structured six-year curriculum, CFL enables schools to adopt a whole-school approach to mental health and wellbeing, while equipping teachers to foster pro-social behaviours, raise environmental awareness and promote animal protection, empowering children not just to learn, but to actively care about the world around them.

Beyond the classroom, the programme creates a lasting ripple effect. Teachers report a marked increase in positive social behaviours, with lessons influencing families and local communities as children carry their learning into everyday life.

Earth Day 2025: Learning to Care for Our Planet

Earth Day sits at the heart of ACTAsia’s CFL programme, offering teachers and students an opportunity to experience this transformative education before implementing the full six-year curriculum.

In April 2025, ACTAsia celebrated its fifth consecutive Earth Day, focusing on biodiversity as a core pillar of “green education.” The programme highlighted the importance of collective action and global responsibility, helping students understand how protecting nature today safeguards their future.

The response was extraordinary:

• 148 schools and educational institutions took part
• 59,000 teachers participated in training workshops
• 16,591 students received biodiversity-themed lessons

Teachers were provided with engaging educational toolkits that explored the interdependence of species, the realities of global biodiversity loss, and the role young people can play in protecting ecosystems. These lessons inspired curiosity, responsibility, and hope — essential foundations for long-term environmental stewardship.

Growing Empathy: ACTAsia’s Summer Camp in rural China

In August, ACTAsia delivered its much-loved Summer Camp at Haiyuan County No. 2 Primary School in rural western China. Over four immersive days, more than 100 children took part in project-based learning, teamwork challenges, and hands-on activities designed to deepen their connection with nature and strengthen empathy for all living beings.

Haiyuan County faces extreme environmental and economic hardship, and research shows children in such regions are at greater risk of depression and academic difficulties. The Summer Camp was designed to counter this by offering joyful, confidence-building experiences that promote social responsibility, emotional well-being, and positive self-belief.

ACTAsia believes that when children begin making small, compassionate choices, those values spread, influencing peers, families, and communities, and contributing to healthier, more resilient societies over time.

The Power of Prevention

As the pressures facing our planet, animals and communities continue to grow, ACTAsia’s work has never been more urgent. Education remains one of the most powerful tools we have to prevent cruelty before it happens, by shaping values, building empathy and helping children understand their responsibility to one another and to the world they share.

By investing in children, we are helping to nurture kinder, more thoughtful human beings, whose choices will influence the health of our planet, the treatment of animals and the well-being of future generations. This is slow, preventative work, but it is also the work that creates the deepest and most lasting change.

We are deeply grateful to our supporters; your belief in this approach makes it possible to reach more children, more schools and more communities each year. With your continued support, ACTAsia will expand its Caring for Life education in the year ahead, ensuring that compassion, responsibility and respect for all living beings are at the heart of learning and at the heart of a more peaceful, compassionate and healthier world for everyone.