OUR Watershed leads to YOUR Beachfront

Use the 5 E's Instructional Model

1. Engage - watch the video, "Plastic Plague," Part of the "These Strange Days on Planet Earth" developed by National Geographic:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1glVFMej_3g


2. Explore - have students use kick nets in a local river to collect samples of what items are traveling down their rivers. Three collections over a week's time at the same location is recommended.
- students are then divide the items up into two categories: natural and
unnatural
- students are then to count the number of pieces of natural items
- students separate the unnatural items into groups: plastic, paper, glass,
etc.
-they are to count the number of pieces in each group
- students then determine the percentage of natural vs. unnatural items in
the collection, then the percentage of each group of unnatural items
collected.
- students, using Excel or other graphing software, enter data and make a
visual display of items collected.
3. Explain -
-using the *FlipChart available @ Promethean Planet titled, "Trash on the
Beach"; go through the lesson that explains how trash gets on to
beaches, the common trash found, and what we can do about it.

4. Elaborate
- during this section of instruction, assign students to groups to become
experts about: your closest watershed and its path to the ocean, trash
disposal in your area, beach collection studies and projects, impacts of
trash on ocean animals
-Each group is then to produce a 2 minute public address podcast
will educate our families about the problem, "Trash on the Beach."
5. Evaluate
-use the second half of the "Trash on the Beach" flipchart to do the evaluation
of students' knowledge.

*If you do not have an interactive whiteboard, you can view this flipchart as a slideshow.