Honeybees, who live in hives, are great pollinators but not native to the U.S. Our wild, native mason bees live alone and look for places to nest in small open cylinders such as hollow stems. But because we have cut down so many forests and paved over so many fields, it is harder for bees … Read more
Recycling is important, but the US does not have the capacity to process all the recyclables we produce. What would it take to change habits, reject single-use packaging and products, and live a “zero waste” lifestyle? Kids can measure their baseline level of trash by carrying around all the waste they generate in a 24 … Read more
Ever heard of energy vampires? They are appliances and electronics that use a lot of electricity even when in “sleep” or “standby” mode. Kids can use a watt meter such as the Kill-A-Watt EZ meter to plug in appliances and see how much power they are “leaking.” Infrared thermometers make it easy to calculate the … Read more
Students can find out what organisms are living in their schoolyard (or backyard) with a cool new phone app called SEEK by I-Naturalist. It geolocates a user without any need to log in and provides pictures of plants, animals, fungi, insects and other organisms that live nearby. Students can earn digital badges by taking pictures … Read more
by weareteachers.com Check out a dozen meaningful Earth Day lessons and investigations for every grade level, from PBS Learning Media. These interactive lessons engage students in exploring energy, ecosystems, and environmental change by taking on engineering design challenges, running simulations, conducting investigations and completing other STEM-oriented activities.
For many species of birds, there is a shortage of great places to nest. There may be birds that would love to call your habitat home, but they have a specific nesting requirement which needs to be met. Birdhouses can be placed in backyards, schoolyards, parks, orchards, farms, pastures, cemeteries, woodlots, deserts, cities…you name it. … Read more
Recycling is important, but it can be complicated. What can’t go in your curbside bin? How many times can something be recycled? What about really large or dangerous items? Find out how and where to recycle items.
Join the Litterati – a global community that is identifying, mapping, and collecting the world’s litter. If you had to guess what makes up most of the trash in the schoolyard, what would it be? Litterati is an app that lets kids geo-tag and categorize the trash they collect during a clean-up campaign, so they … Read more