You kicked your Styrofoam habit and now drink coffee from a mug at work, turn off your PC every night and use both sides of paper before recycling. You try to keep this eco-instinct alive at home, too. But your middle schooler—who's so involved with homework, trumpet practice, math tutoring and his social life—is losing his inclination to save the earth. So how do you rekindle his eco-spark?Continue to lead by example and make time for conservation conversation, says Elizabeth Rogers, an environmental consultant and coauthor of The Green Book: The Everyday Guide to Saving the Planet One Simple Step at a Time. As you flip off the dining room light switch, remind your busy tween that he used to be good at turning off the lights when he left his room. Repeatedly point out that small steps can make a big difference. For instance, by turning off the tap while brushing his teeth, he'll save up to five gallons of water per day. And skipping just one toilet flush a day conserves four and a half gallons—as much water as the average person in Africa uses a day for drinking, bathing, cooking and cleaning. Also appeal to his techie side: Remind him that rather than buying the new Linkin Park CD, he can download the tunes instead. Not only will he save some of his allowance ("A CD is about $15 while an album download is about $10," notes Rogers), he'll cut down on the 45 tons of discarded CDs filling up our landfills every month. Another tech trick: Encourage him to text-message from his cell phone rather than emailing or IM-ing from his computer. A computer uses more than 30 times as much electricity per message as a cell phone. Coach your kid to steer clear of vending machines at school. Nearly 90 percent of junior highs have them, and all of that plastic packaging contributes to ever-growing landfills. And show him how to make a waste-free school lunch by nixing plastic bags and water bottles in favor of reusable food and drink containers. Tell him that just one school generates approximately 18,760 pounds of lunch waste per year.What if your kid says "Ick" to all this eco-talk? Simply remind him that Leo DiCaprio, Brad Pitt and Hayden Panettiere all think saving the earth is sweet.

3 Winning Eco-Ways

Plan a camping trip or a hike to help your child see that our planet is alive and we have to take care of it. Walk to school. Only 31 percent of kids who live less than a mile from school walk or bike, notes environ-mentalist Elizabeth Rogers. If just 6 percent of kids who are driven walked instead, it would save 60,000 gallons of gas a day! start a group project. Spur your child and his pals to start a recycling program at school. Set up a bin for deposit cans and bot-tles in the cafeteria; the kids can return them for cash to donate to school or a charity.

Go Green Online

Eco-conscious kids can network at the National Geographic Kids Group site on imbee.com. Members can access and comment on environment-focused content through the group's blog, videos and photos—a great way for your child to connect with peers as interested in global warming and recycling as he is.