Pour a Pond
Students pour pond water into hula hoops on shower curtains to create their own “pond.” They then work together using dichotomous keys to identify organisms.
Curriculum
Build a Watershed; Just Add Water
Students build and learn about the concept of a watershed and runoff with a student-friendly hands-on investigation.
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Go Fish
An active lesson where students investigate components of habitats and their impact on the survival of populations.
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Fashion a Fish
Students design a fish while learning about adaptations to various habitats.
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Where have all the Lake Trout gone?
Students create and interpret graphs to determine the impact of the sea lamprey on Lake Trout populations.
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Adopt a Habitattitude
Ten lessons on aquatic invasive species for use with students in grades 6-12.
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What is the impact of beach litter?
In this activity, students will construct a web of things that may increase or decrease as a result of beach litter. Student construct a life-size concept map to be to explain many potential impacts of beach litter and then discuss various interpretations of the possible debris impacts.
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Should Chlorine Be Banned from the Great Lakes?
A classroom debate allows students to visualize a complex issue from many different perspectives, describe the legislative process, its functionaries (agencies, individuals involved in creating legislation), and the time involved in creating environmental legislation, and appreciate the difficulties in consensus-building in environmental disputes.
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Where do all the toxins go?
When students have completed this activity, they will be able to demonstrate how chemicals accumulate in fish fat, the biopathways of the toxins in the fish’s body, and ways to prepare fish to avoid consuming the toxins.
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How Big is a Crowd?
The Great Lakes and the surrounding land provide many resources for the people who live in the area. Water for drinking and industry, fish for food, minerals, and other resources are abundant. However, people change the landscape. They create wastes and add chemicals to the environment when they use resources, and these can be harmful. When many people are concentrated in one area, they may compete for resources. In addition, the wastes these people generate tend to concentrate in the area immediately around them and may cause pollution problems.
In this teacher-facilitated activity, learners will construct the five Great Lakes from string and use wrapped candy or peanuts in shells to investigate the impacts of population centers on Great Lakes fish production and water quality. Students learn to compare the relative sizes of the five Great Lakes and their human populations, as well as describe some of the problems that arise when many people
depend on a limited resource.
Objectives
When students have completed this activity, they will be able to:
- Compare the relative sizes of the five Great Lakes and their human populations.
- Describe some of the problems that arise when many people depend on a limited resource.