Teach Writing and Environmental Science All at Once!

 

Teaching writing skills to students opens up the door to all sorts of cross curricular activities. Are you looking for a good reason to take your students out doors but are feeling too much pressure from all the testing requirements? Consider nature journaling, or writing up a report for an experiment that can be conducted outside, such as how long it takes leaves from different tree species to decompose.

 

Science the "Write" Way, by Jodi Wheeler-Topen, will give you ideas for incorporating writing into your science lessons or science into your writing lessons. Geared towards elementary and middle school teachers, the book outlines the processes and methods for teaching science writing through articles that cover lab reports, science journals, field guides, interactive science notebooks, blogs, and even creative nonfiction and environmental poetry.

 

Coming soon to the Environmental Literacy Center!

It's Not Dirt!!! Know Soil Know Life

 

 

 

 

“Without soil we’d be hungry, naked, and homeless," says Clay Robinson, a New Mexico soil scientist and co-editor of Know Soil Know Life, a new book published by the Soil Science Society of America (SSSA) for high school students and undergrads.

 

This book is co-edited by one of our very own! David L. Lindbo is current president of SSSA, and a soil science professor at N.C. State. Covering topics such as soil biology, soil chemistry and classification, this book challenges the reader to gain a new perspective on so called "dirt" as it weaves a thread of human connection throughout and in a capstone chapter titled "Soil and Society".

 

Soon to be at the Environmental Literacy Center, a full review of the book can be found here.

 

For K-12 lesson plans on soil, SSSA has launched a bank of resources found here.

 

Soil science can be correlated to the following areas in the Essential Standards:

 

1st Grade Science: The properties of soils, basic plant needs

3rd Grade Science: Ecosystems- Environmental conditions for plant growth, soil properties

5th Grade Science: Ecosystems- Producers, consumers, and decomposers

6th Grade Science: Formation of soil, monitoring the lithosphere

8th Grade Science: Interconnectedness of energy in the food web and the cycling of matter, Interactions of producers, consumers, and decomposers

Earth/Environmental Science: Factors affecting the lithosphere, erosion and weathering, human impacts on lithosphere, Conventional and sustainable agriculture

Biology: Ecosystems- flow of energy and matter, Human impact on the environment

 

Don't take municipal services for granted!

 

New York City 1893, Harper's Weekly
Source: http://www.onearth.org/article/digging-into-new-york-citys-trashy-history
 

 

Before the advent of municipal services, such as sewage treatment plants and landfills, what did people do with all of their waste? In The Ghost Map: The Story of London's Most Terrifying Epidemic-, author Steven Johnson answers this question and takes us through a thrilling story of the consequences of poor environmental sanitation and health. The book chronicles the story of a cholera outbreak and how the response revolutionized public health and scientific inquiry in the developed world. 

 

A great read for educators or supplemental reading for students exploring the human impact on water supply and environmental health. This book was rated a National Bestseller, a New York Times Notable Book, and Entertainment Weekly's Best Book of the Year.

 

It was assigned a reading level of 18 and up but also appeared on a list of great science books for high school students by Discover magazine.

 

The Penguin Group has provided a reading guide with possible discussion questions found here.