Clips

Retired biologist Al Smith was walking his dog along the rail bed that runs behind Tantramar Regional High School in Sackville, New Brunswick in 1997 when it occurred to him that it would be a great place for a freshwater impoundment. He took this idea to Science Department Head Chris Porter, who quickly latched on to Smith’s vision. Now the Tantramar Wetlands Centre has 40 acres of wetlands, two full-time staff and runs research and education programs year-round for more than 4,000 participants.

Historically, in pre-settlement times the area around the high school was almost entirely saltwater marshes. In the 1600s, the Acadians settled in the area, draining and dyking the marshlands for agriculture. In 1775, English settlers moved in, further draining the marshes. It was about two centuries later than Porter began the project that would restore a part of the Tantramar marshes, benefiting students in the process.

The restoration of the wetlands was “a pretty big engineering requirement,” says Rick Wishart, Director of Education for Ducks Unlimited Canada (DUC). DUC carried out the construction and financed, along with other key partners, what would become the Tantramar Wetlands Centre (TWC).

At the time, the big “buzz” in New Brunswick was uniting curriculum around a common theme, according to Porter, so “the timing was right” for a project that could be used to teach science, art, social studies, and vocational studies in an integrated manner.

Students were involved right from the beginning. About a dozen ninth graders teamed up and shadowed different partners. They met with site engineers to learn how to build impoundments. They learned about the importance of wetlands in the ecosystem from wildlife biologists. They discovered how to develop promotional materials from a communications firm. “It was an opportunity for enrichment for students who wanted to work with the partners,” recalls Porter.

TWC has become a regional centre that provides interdisciplinary programs for other schools. While the centerpiece is the wetlands, TWC also uses a 6,000 square foot indoor facility that provides laboratory space and a fully wired teaching theatre to support the outdoor programs.

Wetheads Teach Younger Students
Each year over 2,000 fourth graders come to TWC to be educated by high school students known as the “Wetheads.” In a field trip developed with DUC, Wetheads use hands-on activities and games to introduce younger students to the values of wetland habitats. Critter dipping, birding, relay games and mystery touch boxes are all part of this action packed field trip.

In preparation for the yearly onslaught of fourth graders, fifty Wetheads, teachers and community volunteers gather at TWC for an annual training day. A Survivorstyle competition aids in the instruction of program elements.

Programs such as Case Study of a Wetland, Population Dynamics, Wetlands through Waterfowl, and Wonders of Wetlands engage students in banding birds, sampling invertebrates, identifying birds and drawing conclusions about the quality of the wetland and the potential threats of human disturbance to its function as a habitat.

“We’re busy. We’re busy even in the winter,” laughs Porter, now the Director of TWC. They’ve added winter programs to accommodate all the visiting schools. “We’re still attracting a lot of kids who want to come down here,” adds Porter, “And we’re still hot in the eyes of the teenagers who work here.” Says 11th grade student Samantha Richard, “The wetlands centre is the most happening place in the school. I love working here.”

Reaching Teachers Too
Students are not the only ones paddling canoes and dipping for insects at TWC; educator workshops ensure teachers are as well informed as their students. Teachers can attend various workshops at the wetlands and at the nearby Jolicure Lakes Field Station during the school year and in the summer. Teacher workshops are offered in cooperation with the New Brunswick Department of Education, Educating for Sustainability in New Brunswick, and regional experiential tour companies.

Wishart says he is impressed “with the enthusiasm and ownership [the high school students] take in the program. They’ve really bought into it and own it—the teachers, too.” Wishart adds, “The teachers use the wetlands to modify what they’re doing, whether it’s math, literature or music.”

Centres of Excellence
Others are impressed, as well. TWC has won several regional and national awards including The Conference Board of Canada’s Partners in Education Award in 2000 and 2003, the Award of Excellence in Environmental Education from the Canadian Network for Environmental Education and Communication (EECOM), and the New Brunswick Environmental Leadership Award.

DUC is using TWC as a template for other schools around Canada. “We’re trying not to make this a unique thing,” says Wishart. DUC is developing a network of wetlands, what they are calling “Wetland Centres of Excellence.” Five schools currently are involved at different stages of development.

From marshes to agricultural fields and back to marshes, Tantramar wetlands have come full circle. And in the process students, teachers and TWC’s many partners have learned a great deal about the importance of wetland habitat and the benefit of integrating environmental education into the school curriculum.

Environmental Education and Training Partnership
January 18, 2006

There are a bunch of insects taped to the wall outside Michelle Boyd’s kindergarten classroom. The drawings have distinguishable heads, thoraxes, abdomens and many legs created from tracings of little hands. But the kindergarteners do more than just draw these critters; they can tell you the correct names for the insects’ body parts and the insects’ role in the environment.

Thanks to a grant Boyd received from the Livingston Education Fund, the Livingston, Montana kindergarten classes get to experience 30 weekly natural science lessons from Montana Outdoor Science School (MOSS), funded by the grant and MOSS.

For over ten years, MOSS has been running interactive natural science and environmental education programs for preschool through adult learners using the diverse environments of southwest Montana as the classroom.

Boyd sought the grant because she saw a need for science at the kindergarten level. “Our day is very short and very packed, and science just wasn’t being taught,” she recalls. With only two and a half hours in the regular kindergarten day, Boyd barely has time to teach reading—the main grade level emphasis—let alone science.

The Livingston Literacy Program: Sneaking in Science
Each August Livingston students are screened for possible participation in a special Literacy Program. Students with special academic or social requirements, the need for a safe environment, or a variety of other special needs, are selected to stay for a full day of kindergarten. The extended instruction focuses on reading. Fifteen of twenty children in Boyd’s class qualified for the Literacy Program, which offered her the perfect opportunity to “sneak” environmental science into her classroom.

For one hour a week during the extended kindergarten, MOSS visits the classroom. The “Science Adventures” program is designed to use the natural environment to promote student learning in science and language arts. Through literature, hands-on activities, field investigations and inquiry skills, the Livingston kindergarteners not only get science, but they improve their reading skills as well.

Science and reading both require many of the same skills—thinking, rethinking, refining, construction, reconstruction. In the same way a student rethinks his or her ideas based on something he or she read, the student rethinks the way a habitat works based on observation or an experiment. “The Science Adventures program provides an opportunity for science to be taught in the classroom, but in an interdisciplinary way,” says Krista Wright, Director of Education for MOSS. “It’s really significant for Michelle’s (Boyd) students to have an outsider come into the classroom and do a dynamic program in an hour,” adds Wright.

Interdisciplinary Instruction
The environmental themes of the Science Adventures program easily lend themselves to integrated interdisciplinary instruction. MOSS works with the teachers and librarians at the two participating schools—East Side and Winans Elementary Schools—to choose children’s literature that illustrates the science concepts the students focus on. The books are kept in the classroom during the week and may be read by the teachers during story time, looked at by the students on their own, or otherwise incorporated into the curriculum.

The MOSS instructors, all of whom have teaching credentials, arrive each week with a storyboard to introduce vocabulary and concepts. Next, weather permitting, the students head out into the school yard for a field exploration. One week, the kindergarteners may learn the difference between coniferous and deciduous trees; the next week they may focus on animal camouflage.

If the weather precludes going outside, an alternate science activity takes place in the classroom. Students might observe a tarantula or snake brought by MOSS, or compare the physical features of skulls.

Next, the MOSS instructors read a children’s book to integrate the reading and science. The program finishes up with an art project such as the insect art in the hallway or owl masks. “They love the art activities,” declares Boyd.

Skills for Teachers
A second goal of Science Adventures is “to give teachers skills to take [the program] on themselves,” says Wright. MOSS developed all the lesson plans and is giving them to the teachers to use in following years. The program combines professional development with teaching students in a way that’s very hands-on and real world for the teachers.

“I’m learning new things every day, with the kids,” says Boyd of her classroom visits from MOSS. She plans to continue with the Science Adventures program on her own.

MOSS has developed school programs for all ages and puts on several Outdoor
Science Days for local schools. With this extensive experience integrating science, literature, art, social sciences and natural history into lesson plans that are challenging, dynamic and fun, it’s no wonder MOSS was an ideal partner for the Livingston Literacy Program.

“Kids love science, and there is so much to learn. And it is the one thing that gets put on the backburner,” Boyd says. But not anymore, with a kick start from MOSS and great lesson plans, Livingston kindergarten teachers should be able to keep science in the classroom.

Environmental Education and Training Partnership
January 16, 2006