The Problem
The sight of stray animals in the streets of my country (Greece) has been a serious concern for me since I was a child. My involvement in animal welfare organizations further reinforced my conviction that the most effective ways to deal with this issue are education and awareness. My concerns also found their way through my work in creative writing and children literature. Inspired by my own classroom in the kindergarten where I work, I finally came up with the idea of creating an educational program which will raise students’ awareness on the issue of stray animals. I started doing some research in the field of environmental education and then expanded into animal ethics. For the first time in my life, I realized that stray animals are only a small category of animals that suffer from all kinds of unethical human exploitation, while other categories of animals, such as livestock and animals used in laboratories remain in obscurity. On the other hand, stray animals is an issue that cannot be easily neglected because it forms part of children’s everyday life. I decided to focus on stray animals hoping to promote their ethical treatment and reinforce a respect towards them.
