New Content Collection from PBS LearningMedia: Think Garden!

With red buds popping, this season can be a great time to arouse students’ curiosity about garden miracles, and Think Garden – one of PBS LearningMedia’s great new content collections  – has just the video resources you’ll need!  This engaging video collection produced by KET (Kentucky Educational Television) helps teach elementary students about the art and science of growing food, with an emphasis on biological and environmental concepts. It also addresses topics related to nutrition and economics.

One of the videos, Think Garden:  Cool Crops explores the possibilities of gardening in the cooler temperatures of spring and fall. Students learn about which vegetables like cool weather and what techniques help plants, like raised beds and hoop houses, grow in these conditions.  They’ll also find out why cool crops are ideal for school gardens.

We hope you like the new look and feel of the PBS LearningMedia site.  Try viewing it on your tablet or phone for an optimized experience.

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Teaching Environmental Health with PBS LearningMedia

With Earth Day starting off our week, here are fresh new ways to teach students about environmental health from PBS LearningMedia.  Enhance your  curriculum with engaging and inspiring content from PBS and trusted producers like KQED and WGBH. To search, save, and share your favorite resources, create an account for free.

Taking Root
Grades 9-12 | Video | Environmentalism in Africa
Meet Wangari Maathai, the first environmentalist – and first African woman – to win the Nobel Peace Prize and illustrate the connection between the environment and other social issues.

Waste Deep
Grades 7-13 | Video | Human Impact on Environment
Examine the state of food waste in America with host Yul Kwon and get an in-depth look at the a landfill’s inner workings.

Where We’ve Been, Where We’re Headed
Grades 6-13 | Video | Environmental Stewardship
See the environmental stewardship of everyday people who transformed the polluted Bay Area.

Scientist Profile: Renewable Energy Scientist
Grades 4-6 | Video | Scientist Profile
Use this career profile to illustrate the practical application of solar and wind power and invite students to assess the viability of other renewable energy sources.

Nowhere to Hide
Grades K-8 | Interactive | Effects of Pollution
Enhance your health, science, and environmental studies curriculum with this clever interactive resource from Kinetic City.

NEW: Prompt debate among your students using this new resource from ITVS that explores the global politics of climate change.

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Real-World Political and Environmental Drama From Independent Lens

On Monday, April 22, at 10:00pm Independent Lens:  The Island President airs on WGBY.  Mohamed Nasheed, former president of the Maldives, confronts a problem greater than any world leader has ever faced — the literal survival of his country and everyone in it due to global warming.  As one of the most low-lying countries in the world, a rise of three feet in sea level would submerge the 1200 islands of the Maldives to make them uninhabitable.

The Island President captures Nasheed’s first year of office, culminating in his trip to the Copenhagen Climate Summit in 2009 when he makes a stirring speech that salvages agreement on a written accord.  Then in February 2012, military and police oust him as leader.  After his efforts to lead protests and campaign for an upcoming election, a Maldives court bans him from travel abroad and he is later imprisoned.  Watch a preview.

In addition to exposing students to this real-world political and environmental drama, you’ll find pages of resources on global warming and political dissent at PBS LearningMedia, where you can search by content, grade level, standards and more.

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Lesson Plan Feature: Cycling Water Through the Environment

With the spring thaw, here’s a lesson  for grades 3-5 from PBS LearningMedia to teach students that water is a crucial ingredient for life on Earth.  They’ll also come to see that the water cycle is Earth’s natural mechanism for transporting, cleansing, and recycling water between the surface and the atmosphere. In this lesson, students recognize the different forms that water takes and learn about where it exists in the environment. Through class discussion and experiments, students model the water cycle and explore how it can be used to create fresh water.

Objectives

• Understand that water exists in the environment in different forms
• Identify the ways that water moves through the environment
• Recognize that most of Earth’s surface is covered by water but that only a small amount is fresh water
• Produce fresh water from salty water by distilling it

Resources include great images of Water Phases (for grades K-5) and an interactive on Global Water Distribution (for grades 3-12) as well as  many short, engaging videos.

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Lesson Plan Feature: “Earth Days: Conveniences and Consequences”

In this lesson, students will consider both the benefits and the hazards of technology in today’s world through the lens of the environment. Students will realize that, while human inventions have made our lives infinitely more healthy, convenient and enjoyable, they have also introduced new threats, such as toxic pollution, that affect both human health and the health of our environment. The challenge confronting our society – and our students – is identifying the proper use of technology to improve our lives while still protecting the quality of the natural world.

This lesson is appropriate for grades 8-12 and requires 2-3 class periods; a portion of activity three will be completed as homework.

Objectives: 
After completing this lesson, students will be able to:

• Consider how technology has both improved our lives and created new threats to environmental and human health.
• Consider how we can maximize the benefits of technology while minimizing the associated harm, largely by applying the “Precautionary Principle” to new technologies.
• Reflect on how modern electronics are changing how we relate to the natural world.

View the full lesson plan at the American Experience website.

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Viewing Earth from Space with NOVA

With our predictably unpredictable climate in recent years, NOVA’s amazing, new documentary “Earth from Space,” offers engaging and relevant material to adapt for the classroom with photos, computer models, video and other data on subjects such as how a weather or geological event on one side of our globe might affect life on the other side.

WGBY airs the film on February 13 from 9:00pm -11:00pm, after which you can also view it at NOVA’s website where you’ll find related links.  At the NOVA beta site there are literally hundreds of resources on subjects like Planet Earth and Space and Flight, some of which are designed specifically for teachers.  Or just follow the link to NOVA Education to search your own topics.  For example, on the subject of weather, you’ll find Climate Change and Sandy, What Does the Earth Sound Like? and Fastest Glacier.

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Volcanoes: Life on Fire

PBS adds the volcano-centric series Life on Fire to “Exploration Wednesdays,” its science- and nature-based programming block on Wednesday evenings. Narrated by actor Jeremy Irons, Life on Fire paints a detailed picture of the struggles and amazing adaptations required to survive around volcanoes — some of the most spectacular and powerful forces on our planet. The six-part series airs following the NATURE and NOVA series, Wednesdays through February 6, 2013, 10:00p.m.on WGBY.

Like humans, volcanoes have a natural life cycle: they are born, live for a period then die. Surrounding these giants of fire and ash, natural selection has only retained those capable of adapting to the three phases of an eruption: before, during and after.  For additional resources to teach volcano’s valuable lessons, PBS Learning Media offers scores of resources, such as Magic Dogs of the Volcanoes (Interactive, PreK-4), Vibrant Volcanoes (Lesson Plan, Grades 2-6) , The World of Volcanoes  (Video, 6-12).

Additional teacher resources can be found on NOVA Education and include Mass Extinction, (Video and Discussion, Grades 6-12), Build an Island(Interactive, Grades 6-12) and Mount Pinatubo:  Predicting a Volcano (Video, Grades 6-12).

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PBS LearningMedia: Water-Conservation Education

Insufficient supplies of water have become a major global issue, making water-conservation education important for students.  A recent  New York Times article reports that in Texas, where regions have been experiencing severe drought, school districts are finding ways to provide interactive learning to encourage water conservation.

Here are a few of the resources you’ll find at PBS LearningMedia to help students learn about our need to use water wisely:

Air and Water: Water  (Interactive, Grades K-5)  Children discover why water is important to human beings. They also learn how water becomes polluted and find out what one can do to reduce pollution and conserve water.

Water (Video, Grades 4-6)  This video segment from IdahoPTV’s D4K shows us from where we get water, how it’s stored and how powerful it can be. We learn how important it is to conserve the .3% of usable fresh water available on earth.

Water Conservation:  Mexico  (Video, Grades 3-12) This video segment adapted from Last Oasis shows the challenges Mexico City faces in providing enough water for its growing population. As a result of over pumping of its ground water, some parts of the city are sinking 12 inches a year.

Water Use and Conservation:  (Lesson Plans, Grades 3-12) These lessons plans from WNET’s Planet H20 help students consider what it means to conserve water, monitor daily water use and propose methods for home water conservation.

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Earth Science Resources from PBS LearningMedia

Celebrate the wonders of science during Earth Science Week through PBS LearningMedia. These featured resources help students uncover facts about land, water, and the atmosphere, and  illustrate the powerful natural forces that shape our planet:

Gravity at Earth’s Center
Grades 6-12 | Video + Support Materials
Send students on a journey with astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson to explore what would happen if they were to fall though a hole in the center of the Earth. A video clip enhances discussions on gravity and objects in motion.

Geology
Grades 4-6 | Video + Discussion Questions
Expand students’ vocabulary and understanding of the various geologic forces that affect the Earth.  The  video illustrates the impact of earthquakes, volcanoes, water, and glaciers on the planet.

The Hydrologic Cycle
Grades 3-8 | Interactive + Support Materials
Invite students to explore the five main processes that comprise the hydraulic cycle and use this interactive resource from NASA to demonstrate how water is perpetually recycled between Earth’s surface and the atmosphere.

The Dirt on Dirt
Grades PreK-1 | Video
Get the dirt on what it’s like to be an earthworm by visiting its underground habitat. A catchy song imparts to young students to  the significance of the soil on subterranean life.

Love to Teach? Then LIKE PBS LearningMedia! PBS wants to recognize teachers for all that they do. Enter the Love to Teach? LIKE PBS LearningMedia Facebook promotion for the chance to win great prizes for you and your classroom. Click here to enter

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Video Challenges Unbelievers of Global Warming

This video chronicles a rare crossing through the Northwest Passage, made possible by melting ice due to climate change. The documentary challenges policy makers to consider the impact of the melting ice caps on the future of mankind. The title of this timely DVD is The Polar Explorer, ID229. Borrow it from the WGBY Video Lending Library for a month by clicking here.

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