August 2016

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Region 10 office (Seattle) have created a team of student interns and environmental professionals who have assembled a series of lesson plans for children from kindergarten to fifth grade. This program, dubbed EcoLearn, is a unique approach which allows volunteers from the community to deliver environmental curriculum while sharing their experiences with the students. These lessons plans help incorporate education on environmental and sustainability awareness and issues with Common Core and Next Generation Science Standard aligned STEM education. Resources were developed with contributions from EPA, PBS, National Geographic, National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), and other educational institutions. Modeled on Junior Achievement, this approach has proven both effective and efficient in delivering targeted education to students.

For more project background and need, please see the enclosed one page document.

We hope to have your school become a partner in our study and provide us with authentic feedback to ensure the success of the project.

Our partnership will require one of our interns to come to your school and test the curriculum. The basis of the lesson plans are that anyone can teach them anywhere in an hour with just a little prep time. This project will not work without your honest input and feedback on how the students respond to each lesson plan. Each of the lessons meets individual Washington State, Environmental and Sustainability Education standards complementing current elementary school curricula. The Washington State standards have been updated to include the Next Generation Science Standards and the Common Core State Standards.

EPA 10 would like EPA 2016/2017 interns to pilot the curriculum in classrooms and educational forums, provide their feedback, and relay teacher feedback on the curriculum during the 2016/2017 school year.

In order to teach the complete curriculum (8 lessons) in your classroom during the 2016/2017 school year, an intern will commit to teach in your classroom one hour per month from October 2016 – April 2017.

The EPA and our future would appreciate your school for being a part of this pilot and help make history. Thank you for your time. We look forward to hearing back from you.

If you’re interested in EPA interns piloting the EcoLearn K-5 curriculum at your school or in your classroom, please contact Sally Hanft at the U.S. EPA Region 10 Environmental Education Coordinator at hanft.sally@epa.gov or 206.553.1207) or discuss your interest with the intern with the intern that is interested in working in your school.

EcoLearn K-5 Curriculum Pilot - Background

U.S. EPA Region 9 and 10

EcoLearn K-5 Development

The Ecolearn K-5 curriculum was developed by six 2014/2015 EPA interns and supervised by the Environmental Education Coordinator in EPA Region 10 (Seattle) and sustainability staff in Region 9 (San Francisco) and 10. It is aligned with the Common Core, Next Generation Science Standards, and Washington State Sustainability Education Standards.

Need

A quick web search for environmental curriculum results in over 182,000,000 results. This indicates both the need and the overwhelming process of identifying effective curriculum to teach the concepts of environmental education in the classroom. In addition, current standards focus environmental education on scientific discovery, not environmental protection and action. Finally, environmental education at the elementary level is an effective way of educating both the students and the parents about the opportunities and impacts of human action on the environment.

Solution

A linked set of lesson plans that cover core topics related to environmental protection and sustainability in an age appropriate way. The lesson plans can be used individually or as a set that both build within the school year and between school years. The lesson plans are tied to both the Common Core State Standards and the Next Generation Science Standards and include:

Empirical modules for each grade level that can be implemented by an external facilitator or by the classroom teacher

Eight topics per grade lasting approximately 1 hour per topic

water, air, ecosystem, food, waste, climate change, animals, energy

Topics and methods based on age-appropriate instructional research

EPA is mandated under the National Environmental Education Act of 1990 to provide national leadership to increase environmental literacy. Although EcoLearn lesson plans were developed for EPA to go out into classrooms, they can be applicable everywhere. This supports our mandate and helps us make a visible difference in our communities.