Earth Day-Bringing it Home Everyday!

STEM?  The objective is to not teach separate subjects, but to teach those subjects within the context that they occur in the real world.  Earth Day reminds us that there are hundreds of environmental issues that need to be resolved many of which are right in your own backyard. 

Earth Day is an everyday opportunity!

Looking at environmental issues any day of the year is a great source of problems that need solving – ripe for an authentic Problem Based Learning Unit.  Many times environmental issues are full of different perspectives (global warming for example) that are perfect for helping students understand perspectives, read informational texts, find evidence to support claims and collaborate on solutions fitting perfectly with the Common Core.  It is easy to hit Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics principles (STEM) if you are collecting data, graphing, problem solving, engineering solutions and using technology to share results and campaign for solutions all within a local habitat.

So what is in your backyard? 

Have students check out the local paper to see if there are land use issues or other environmental issues going on around town:

Does your community have sound, noise, light, or air pollution?

Does your community have water issues, too much, too little, too polluted?

Does your community need sprucing up?  Is graffiti or litter a problem?

How about your school building?  Can you do a simple litter survey in the halls? What types of litter did you find?  Who is responsible for it?  How could it be stopped? 

How about the lunchroom?  How much garbage do you generate? Where does your garbage go?  Can it be reduced?  What can be re-used (we raised a pig at our school to eat all of the leftovers!)? Recycled?  How can plants help the environment inside or outside your school building? 

How about doing an energy audit of your building or your home? 

Act Local, Think Global

You can help your students learn about and improve the world around them with simple projects based on local problems. 

Want to go global?  Edutopia has some great Earth day projects with global sharing opportunities.

Want to teach your students about activism?  Check out this blog on Teaching and the Environmental Crisis, which features schools that have taken action to improve their environment and communities.

Looking for more great resources?  Check out Great Interactive Resources for Earth Day.

What is in your backyard? Have your students been involved in a community environmental issue?  Please share!

Technology Possibilities in the Outdoor Classroom

Once upon a time, in a galaxy far away, I was assigned to teach environmental education.  This was before “www” or ianything.    We forged an environmental trail outside, where students identified trees and other biological phenomena (wasps nests, fox holes, ground cover, lichens, bracket fungi, woodpecker damage, etc) .  We numbered these areas with wooden signs and created a booklet so that children from the younger grades could take a hike and learn all about the world outside their door.  We used wood burning tools, paint, hammers, nails, saws, guidebooks and a local forester.  We created a booklet and ran it off on the ditto machine (mmmm that smell) to share with students in our district.

Fast forward today.  Some people say that technology keeps our children inside.  That students are not looking at the real thing anymore, that they live in a virtual world.   My mind, however, boggles at the possibilities that technology has put in the hands of our students.   

Take that same environmental trail and imagine this:

Students leading other students from faraway lands (like TX or CA or even off country) right through our woods giving them a tour via skype!

Or

The guidebook is now an ibook with pictures (from different seasons!) and links for more information that hikers can take on the trail with them.

Or

Students can create podcasts for each one of the numbered stations in the woods.

Or

Students can track growth and change (seasonal and otherwise) of one particular spot, in detail.

Or

Well, I am sure that you get the idea and I hope that you have ideas to add.

We will be discussing using the outdoors this Tuesday night, 8:30 in the #NJED twitter chat…please join us or stay tuned and I will add ideas that were shared right here!   (and Happy Earth Day!)

Great Interactive Resources for Earth Day

Looking for some great ideas and resources to help celebrate earth day?  Want to break up the testing blues, get kids thinking and writing in an engaging way?

Paper or plastic?

Start a discussion on something that is both relevant to them and authentic.  They may not be able to directly influence gas prices or oil drilling, but they can certainly make wise choices in their own lives.  Start with the simple question “paper or plastic?”


Check out this great interactive lesson “Battle of the Bags.” Videos and interactive sections provide students with different points of view on the Paper vs. Plastic debate.  Assign students a point of view to focus on, have them debate, write persuasively or use it to provide background information for a SCAN session.


Follow that up with a four perspective discussion using the simple SCAN (see the issues, clarify the issues, assess what’s important, now what should we do?) critical thinking strategy built into the SCAN discussion platform at TregoED.org.  "The Environmental Debate:  Paper or Plastic" is one of over 100 free scenarios.


Want a hands-on experiment to go with it?  Try out this free lesson to determine “Which kind of trash bag breaks down the fastest?"


Let students see where their garbage or recyclables go on collection day by selecting and following their trail at "Beyond the Barrel" site for kids.


The Story of Stuff is a 20 minute online cartoon that traces our “stuff” from its creation to its cremation.  This video definitely represents one point of view.  Can your students determine what other points of view may be?  Can they pick out the persuasive language used? Use this video to launch a discussion that goes beyond the content.


National Geographic's "Human Footprint" offers a fun interactive site that allows children to see what their human footprint is on the earth.  There is a lot of potential for math lessons here as they calculate the number of loaves of bread or eggs you eat in a year and illustrate the impact of your choices.


Looking for more?


Teachersfirst.org has a great selection of links and resources on earth day:  You can find all sorts of great links and resources using their searchable data base of reviewed activities.

You can also find a great list of links and resources for Earth Day at Edudemic.


Earth Day is a great day to integrate technology science, language arts, math and history.  What will you be doing?