Environmental Connections

Lower Elementary (K-2)

Activities

» Creatures in Motion
Students form a millipede and walk around the room, then discuss the cooperative challenges that they observed.

» Crowding Can Be Seedy
Students experience the effects of increasing population density when they pretend to be sprouting plants in a garden.

» Who Polluted the River?
Through an interactive story, students learn how our rivers have been affected by our growing population.

Upper Elementary (3-5)

Activities

» Cougar Hunt

A simulation in which participants are cougars trying to amass enough food to survive, leading to discussions of carrying capacity and resource distribution.

Intermediate (6-8)

Activities

» A World of Difference
Through a simulation, students compare biodiversity in North America to a tropical rainforest.

» Earth: Apple of our Eye?
A demonstration of worldwide land distribution -- the instructor slices an apple to represent land used for farming.

» Eco-Ethics
In groups, students explore and discuss their personal code of environmental ethics by discussing eco-dilemmas.

» Mining for Chocolate
Using toothpicks, students extract chocolate chips from cookies, simulating mining.

Secondary (9-12)

Activities

» Something for Everyone
A simulation where students compete for natural resources in a commons, then discuss the social dilemmas that arise.

» Take a Stand
Students clarify their values and learn about environmental topics by reacting to a series of provacative statements.

» Water, Water Everywhere
A demonstration of where water can be found in the world.