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One too many!: Workshop on human population and its impact by Pooja Choksi

February 5, 2014 • Posted in: News, Workshops

It’s time to talk about the elephant in the room- our ever growing population!

Population and our resources- pooja 22-23 jan, 20141 (1)

This week, the students at the E-Base understood just how damaging an unchecked, expanding human population can be. The students first went through their numbers just to fathom through visual presentation the weight of numbers. Then came the guessing game- the students had to guess the population of their village, district and finally, India. We had some entertaining answers being flung around. From 1000 to a billion, no number was spared from scrutiny by the students.

Students putting up 1's and 0's to truly understand the weight of each of the numbers

Students putting up 1’s and 0’s to truly understand the weight of each of the numbers

Examining and trying to make educated guesses about the local, national and world population.

Examining and trying to make educated guesses about the local, national and world population.

To really put things into perspective, the students played the Earth time-line game. The game gave the students a lot of food for thought- from why the population exploded in the early 90s to the consequences for our biodiversity and resources of the same. They now physically experienced exponential growth trying to squeeze in on the little planet of the game.

Right from the 1500s to the 2000s in a few minutes- exponential growth explained in a jiffy!

Right from the 1500s to the 2000s in a few minutes- exponential growth explained in a jiffy!

An activity that really got the students in a competitive mood was that of the forest manager and wood cutter. The students chose their wood cutter and forest manager, the rest becoming trees of a forest for the activity. The students learnt just how vital resource management is in today’s times. Yes, mathematics is useful when it comes to sustainable living! The poor wood cutter didn’t have much of a say in front of our forest of students by the end of the activity!

Our woodcutter at work in his 'forest'!

Our woodcutter at work in his ‘forest’!

With our growing constructions, public infrastructure, demand for resources and the likes, we are pushing our biodiversity in a corner instead of embracing it and building a world around it. To end the workshop, the students worked on solutions to possible problems of the future due to a larger human population.

A quick game to test their learning and their running too!

A quick game to test their learning and their running too!

So, to all our readers, we’d like to say it’s time to wise up! Let’s keep that population in check, find ways to establish a harmonious coexistence with our natural world, and brush up our mathematics because we’re really going to need it to live sustainably!

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