Activities
Be a Watershed
To introduce watershed concepts, students will become a watershed and experience firsthand its interconnectedness, and how water flows from lake to stream to river to ocean. Students will work together to create/become different watershed features. This activity will give students basic watershed knowledge before moving forward to discuss how watersheds are influenced by outside sources and system... More »
Biodiversity Jenga
Pair up Bill Nye the Science Guy and Jenga to kick off the Biodiversity Watershed Experience. This activity engages students with the concept of biodiversity, and underscores the importance of maintaining healthy, diverse ecosystems. Students remove native species from an ecosystem, and add non-native or invasive species. They see and understand how these actions may ultimately compromise the heal... More »
Conduct Oral History Interviews
Students conduct formal, tape-recorded or videotaped oral history interviews of community members. Exposure to the diversity of interviewees’ experiences, values, and perspectives provides students with a deeper understanding of past and current community values for watershed resources. This activity was developed as part of the Penobscot River Watershed Education Program, a collaborative pro... More »
Connect the Species
Connect the Species lets students summarize all of the work they did during their All My Watershed Neighbors Watershed Experience. This activity extends the Scientific Conference Species Swap where students learned about the species that their classmates researched. In Connect the Species, students describe connections among the species in their watershed habitats (including humans) and create ... More »
Cultural and Historical Research
Students visit local museums and historical societies, where they conduct cultural and historical research to broaden and deepen their knowledge of past and present community connections to watershed resources. Students use social science research skills to record their observations and ask questions of local historians. This activity was developed as part of the Penobscot River Watershed Educa... More »
Diversity Statements
Students work together to come up with their own working definition of diversity and biodiversity that everyone understands and can use effectively. This definition will lay the conceptual groundwork for students’ investigation of biodiversity in a local ecosystem through the Biodiversity Watershed Experience.... More »
Get to Know Your Community
Students define the idea of community in small groups and as a class, come up with a working definition for the word, and spend twenty minutes reflecting on what it means to be from the community that they call home. This activity was developed as part of the Penobscot River Watershed Education Program, a collaborative project led by Maine Sea Grant, the University of Maine Senator George J. M... More »
Get to Know Your Watershed
Students define the term watershed, and identify their local watershed using Google Earth and US Geological Survey (USGS) topographic maps. Students then identify water bodies and other geographic features, human communities, and habitat types within the boundaries of their watershed. This activity was developed as part of the Penobscot River Watershed Education Program, a collaborative projec... More »
Google Earth Diversity Trip
Students take a Google Earth Diversity Trip to engage with the idea of biodiversity in their local watershed. Google Earth is a free online resource that lets you fly anywhere on Earth to view satellite imagery and maps. Using this tool, students become more familiar with the boundaries, features, and orientation of their own watershed within the larger Gulf of Maine watershed. This activity b... More »
Here Banana! Build skills to find (and not find) what you are looking for
Students conduct this simple investigation with familiar materials to get in the groove of looking carefully for something, making a claim that they found it or did not find it, and supporting that claim with solid, bullet proof evidence. Students plan and carry out a short, sweet investigation to determine whether or not a “species” is in an “ecosystem” or not. They figure out for thems... More »
I Live Here Too
Students take on the role of a scientist as they research a species that they have a close, personal relationship to…themselves! This activity complements the Species Investigation activity, using humans as the focus species. Research questions prompt students to think about why they live here, what resources they need to survive, and how they share these resources with other species in their ha... More »
Looking Closely
Students practice Looking Closely at a leaf, flower, leg, wing, shell, etc. to really hone their observation skills and see the pieces and parts they wouldn’t otherwise see. Species observation skills gained during this detailed drawing activity will help students tell different species apart when they do their own investigation during the Biodiversity Watershed Experience. This activity may be ... More »
My Scientific Study
Students who have participated in the Gulf of Maine Research Institute’s LabVenture! program will use their personalized websites to reflect on the research skills they gained and the species knowledge they learned. This activity will guide students through the four LabVenture! stations they completed by revisiting familiar content and answering new questions. This reflection process prepares... More »
My Watershed Connections
Students use visual art and social studies skills to develop maps that illustrate their personal values for local watershed resources and ways they use watershed resources in daily life. Students then share their watershed maps with one another through a gallery walk. This activity was developed as part of the Penobscot River Watershed Education Program, a collaborative project led by Maine Sea... More »
My Watershed Habitats
This activity has students diving deeper into and identifying the different types of habitats (and microhabitats) that are within their own local watershed. Students were briefly introduced to habitats as they explored and defined watersheds in Be a Watershed or Get to Know your Watershed. Working together as a class and using published definitions, students will develop their own definition an... More »
