{"id":12504,"date":"2015-12-21T08:00:07","date_gmt":"2015-12-21T13:00:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/?p=12504"},"modified":"2017-04-14T18:16:48","modified_gmt":"2017-04-14T22:16:48","slug":"explore-and-restore","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/2015\/12\/21\/explore-and-restore\/","title":{"rendered":"Through an Educator\u2019s Eyes: Explore and Restore Maryland Streams"},"content":{"rendered":"

Investigating microhabitats; department photo<\/p><\/div>\n

Modeling practices used by Department of Natural Resources scientists, adventurous teachers and their inspired students have been heading out of the classroom to monitor streams across the state. Their mission: to determine the health and conditions of waterways near their schools.<\/p>\n

Conducted through the Explore and Restore Maryland Streams<\/a> program, department biologists host one-day professional development workshops on a range of topics: stream ecology, how land use influences streams and which animals call these ecosystems home. They prepare teachers to facilitate biological, chemical and physical assessments, allowing them to grow their content knowledge as well as their confidence working in outdoor environments.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Explore and Restore<\/em> started in 2012 as a partnership between environmental educators and scientists to connect students with streams. The collaboration led to the development of a workshop and accompanying resources that show teachers how to use streams as a living laboratory. The program is expanding through funding provided to partners to work with additional schools statewide.<\/span><\/p>\n

Since its onset, the program has reached more than 150 schools and 283 teachers in 22 counties and Baltimore City. Educators at 77 schools are slated to receive training throughout the 2015-2016 academic year, with a reach of more than 12,000 students.\u00a0<\/span><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

A teacher\u2019s tale<\/strong>
\nSuzanne Hughes\u2014a recent workshop participant\u2014from Reservoir High School in Howard County raves over the Explore and Restore Maryland Streams<\/em> program.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s always nice to attend meetings for professional development and actually get out and do something meaningful that the students are going to use and find helpful,\u201d Hughes says.<\/p>\n

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Teachers learn how to measure and monitor storm impact; department photo<\/p><\/div>\n

The program uses the diversity of life within a stream\u2014fish, salamanders, macro invertebrates\u2014as an indication of its health. Students use current scientific practices to arrive at a conclusive water quality assessment, and ultimately use their findings to take appropriate action to improve the stream\u2019s health.<\/p>\n

Hughes and others in the workshop found they didn\u2019t need a lot of high tech equipment or resources to incorporate most of the activities into the classroom or lead students through investigations of nearby streams.<\/p>\n

\u201cThrough Explore and Restore, the students gain a deeper appreciation for their surroundings,\u201d Hughes says. \u201cWhen you get them to turn off the TV and go outside without their phones for a couple of hours, it makes a huge difference in how they see everything around them.\u201d<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Taking the classroom outside<\/strong>
\nHughes found that through these outdoor experiences<\/a> her students got a chance to engage and connect with concepts discussed in the classroom. After students investigate and analyze their data, they are asked to propose and implement an action plan to improve the conditions: perhaps building a rain garden or developing a plan for community outreach.<\/p>\n

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Students gather and collect data; department photo<\/p><\/div>\n

\u201cYou can do a lab, but it doesn\u2019t really connect with anything beyond the classroom,\u201d Hughes says. \u201cThis experience links everything together for the kids\u2014they aren\u2019t looking at disjointed pieces. It\u2019s wonderful to see everything fall into place for them.\u201d<\/p>\n

An added bonus for teachers, students love the experience and exposure to nature. Even if they aren\u2019t excited in the beginning of the project, they eventually get keyed up.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve had students say ‘I\u2019m not touching any bugs!’ and yet, they can\u2019t not<\/em> do it,\u201d Hughes says. \u201cThey\u2019re wading in the water, even in cold water. They\u2019re picking up leaves and rocks, trying to find something\u2026trying to find more than the next person. I\u2019ve had kids look around introspectively and say ‘Jeez, it\u2019s really beautiful out here,’ as if they just had never thought about it before.\u201d<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

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Students gather and collect data; department photo<\/p><\/div>\n

Empowering students<\/strong>
\nIn the wake of such a practical lesson, students take away a new appreciation for how important it is to tread lightly in the environment\u2014to be more conscious of what they put down a storm drain, to think about where trash ends up, to recycle.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe biggest takeaway for students that I can see is an understanding that what they do has an impact on a lot of other things,\u201d Hughes says. \u201cWhen they throw trash on the ground, for example, it\u2019s not just a stand-alone event when everybody else does the same thing. They get a better grasp for the impact of many actions that might occur on a daily basis and they start to realize change can start with them.\u201d<\/p>\n

Hughes has even given other teachers within her school some tools to use with their students to introduce some program concepts. Her fellow educators have introduced their own students to water monitoring, reinforcing how the health of the stream impacts the fate of the Chesapeake Bay and, equally, how everyone effects the environment.<\/p>\n

\u201cI would recommend this program to any teacher,\u201d Hughes concludes. \u201cI plan to use my training for years to come and I\u2019m confident that it will continue to have a big impact on my students: the future of Maryland.\u201d<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Article by Amanda Sullivan<\/b>\u2014Chesapeake & Coastal Service streams education coordinator.<\/em>
\nAppears in Vol. 19, No. 1\u00a0of the Maryland Natural Resource magazine, winter\u00a02016.<\/em><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Modeling practices used by Department of Natural Resources scientists, adventurous teachers and their inspired students have been heading out of the classroom to monitor streams across the state. Their mission: to determine the health and conditions of waterways near their schools. Conducted through the Explore and Restore Maryland Streams program, department biologists host one-day professional  Read the Rest…<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":140,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[957,33],"tags":[3168],"class_list":["post-12504","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-appnews","category-the-bay","tag-magazine"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12504","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/140"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12504"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12504\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12528,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12504\/revisions\/12528"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12504"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12504"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12504"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}