Why Teach About the Clean Water Act?

October 15th, 2012 by Sarah

Bringing in the catch on the Chesapeake Bay during the 2011 Youth Fishing Adventure. Image credit: Janet Krenn/VASG

Do you think we should be able to safely fish and swim in our nation’s waters?  It may sound like a pretty basic goal, but these rights have not always been protected with the same vigor as they are today.

Though it was originally enacted in 1948 as the Federal Water Pollution Control Act, the Clean Water Act was totally revised in 1972 to give the Act its current shape.  This federal regulation set a new national goal “to restore and maintain the chemical, physical, and biological integrity of the Nation’s waters”, and set an overarching environmental goal that all waters in the United States be “fishable” and “swimmable.”

Why Should YOU Teach About The Clean Water Act?

This October marks the 40th anniversary of the Clean Water Act!  On October 18, 1972, Congress passed the Clean Water Act, providing a comprehensive strategy for dealing with water pollution.  Whether you are teaching about science, civics, history, or law, the Clean Water Act is a great topic to focus on. The Clean Water Act is especially relevant in the Chesapeake Bay watershed, the first estuary in the nation to be targeted by Congress for restoration and protection!

How Can YOU Teach About The Clean Water Act?

With the 40th anniversary of this legislation upon us, some great teaching resources have been coming out.  Here is a list of some great lesson plans and resources you can use to teach about the Clean Water Act in your classroom:

  • Clean Water: It’s The Law – This is a great lesson plan from Discovery Education.  In this activity, 3-5 grade students will describe the serious state of U.S. water systems before the Clean Water Act was passed, summarize the importance of laws protecting the environment and natural resources, and the challenge of creating laws that are fair to all water users, and discuss the concerns surrounding nonpoint sources pollution.  Students will also list ways that people can help minimize water pollution.
  • The Water Sourcebooks – The Water Sourcebooks contain 324 activities for grades K-12 divided into four sections: K-2, 3-5, 5-8, and 9-12. Each section is divided into five chapters: Introduction to Water, Drinking Water and Wastewater Treatment, Surface Water Resources, Ground Water Resources, and Wetlands and Coastal Waters.  This EPA environmental education program explains the water management cycle using a balanced approach showing how it affects all aspects of the environment. All activities contain hands-on investigations, fact sheets, reference materials, and a glossary of terms, and the 3-5, 5-8, and 9-12 grade level editions of the Water Sourcebook all feature lesson plan(s) on the Clean Water Act.
  • You Be the Judge – In this PBS lesson, students in grades 9-12 will research and evaluate a U.S. Supreme Court case that reviewed the jurisdiction of the Clean Water Act and assesses environmental and business interests. Students will debate case arguments with classmates using data collected from research activities, analyze case information, and write about the decision they would make if they were members of the U.S. Supreme Court.
  • Water Quality Teacher Resources – Are you looking for a specific type of educational resource about water quality?  Check out Bay Backpack’s inventory of water quality teacher resources.  Search for water quality resources by subject, school level, resource type, or alignment to state/national curriculum standards!
  • EPA Water Education Resources – EPA’s Office of Environmental Education offers many educational resources for students, parents and educators.  This collection focuses on water education.
  • Chesapeake Bay Program History –Since the Chesapeake Bay Program’s formation in 1983, several written agreements have guided the partnership’s pollution reduction and ecosystem restoration efforts. Share a “local” example of water policy with your students by learning about the history and policies that guide the Chesapeake Bay Program.
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Sarah Brzezinski works for the Chesapeake Research Consortium as the Chesapeake Bay Program's Fostering Stewardship and Education Workgroup Team Staffer. She also serves as the content manager of Bay Backpack.

Trio of Terrapins Teach Triadelphia Ridge Students

June 25th, 2012 by Carol

Triadelphia students learned about terrapin research and monitoring programs first-hand.

After wading through a small stretch of wetland, students prepared to release their terrapins.

Students each whispered a wish or a worry for their terrapins to carry with them upon their release.

A fun school year project may have been wrapped-up when students released their terrapins, but the stewardship ethics they learned and the passion for the Chesapeake Bay they acquired is something students will carry with them.

Triadelphia Ridge Elementary School fourth grade students spent an exciting and motivating school year learning about and caring for baby Diamondback Terrapins.  The terrapins named Ledo, Waffles, and Pebbles were located in a large aquarium in my Gifted and Talented classroom. They were on loan from the Terrapin Institute located in Neavitt, Maryland, as part of their Head-Start program.

The goal of the program is for the terrapins to spend the first 9 – 12 months of their lives eating and growing until they are large enough to increase their chance of surviving in the wild.  This program was a natural extension for the Triadelphia Ridge fourth grade students who had just completed a unit that focused on the conservation and stewardship of the Chesapeake Bay. The children were amazed to learn that the diamondback terrapin is believed to be the only turtle in the world that lives exclusively in brackish water. Throughout the year the children participated in feeding, weighing and measuring the baby Terrapins.  Students enjoyed learning about Terrapin biology, diet, behavior, and most importantly threats to Terrapins in the Chesapeake Bay. These threats included loss of habitat, pollution, and frequent drowning in crab traps.  The fourth grade students learned that installing a bycatch reduction device to crab pots is an effective way to reduce drowning of terrapins.

The program allowed for the students to experience a meaningful real-life connection to the Bay and will without a doubt positively affect the choices that the children make as they live and grow up in the Chesapeake Bay watershed.  It is amazing how three little terrapins can light a fire of conservation and stewardship in a child.  The students understand that terrapin health, as well as the health of all living things in Bay is directly impacted by the health of the Bay waters.

On a sunny Saturday morning in early June, Triadelphia Ridge Families journeyed to the Chesapeake Bay Maritime Museum to release the Terrapins into the Bay. Jeff Popp from the Terrapin Institute tagged the Terrapins and coordinated the release.  The students gently placed the baby Terrapins into the water and watched them swim out to a bright and promising future.  The baby Terrapins carried with them a wish and a worry that each student whispered as they were released. The students were proud of how large their terrapins had grown but most importantly they have a new awareness of why and how they should and can make a difference in the health and well being of our local treasure, The Chesapeake Bay. This was truly a memorable experience for the students and staff of Triadelphia Ridge Elementary School.

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Carol Brzezinski is a gifted and talented resource teacher at Triadelphia Ridge Elementary School

Celebrate Halloween by Teaching about Creepy, Crawly Marcoinvertebrates

October 31st, 2011 by Megan

Using a D-net, students collect macroinvertebrates. Image courtesy of USFWS/Southeast, via Flickr.

It’s Halloween in the Chesapeake Bay watershed! This is a perfect opportunity to introduce your students to the creepy creatures lurking beneath rocks in your local stream.  While benthic macroinvertebrates may appear gruesome at first glance, a closer look reveals that these organisms are perfectly adapted to live and feed in their environment.

  • Shredders, such as stonefly larvae, use their strong mouthparts to chew through leaves and twigs that fall into the stream from the canopy above.
  • Collectors, such as caddisfly larvae, use specialized mouth parts to gather and feed on organic particles from the stream.
  • Scrapers, such as mayfly larvae, graze algae from rocks.  Some of these macroinvertebrates have strong claws that help them grip rocks in swift currents.
  • Predators, such as dobsonfly larvae, have sharp mouthparts that help them eat other macroinvertebrates.

Benthic macroinvertebrates are often used as indicators of water quality because they inhabit almost all aquatic environments and have a wide range of tolerance to pollutants.  Far from frightening, stonefly larvae (which are only found in pristine streams) are a beautiful sight to many stream biologists.

You can use the lesson plans below to begin your budding stream biologists’ love affair with bugs.

Stonefly

Midge

Water Mite

Mayfly

Macroinvertebrate images courtesy of http://www.nwnature.net/macros/index.html
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Megan Hession is the Chesapeake Bay Program's Habitat Team Staffer.

Flooding in the Chesapeake Bay Watershed: Teach About It!

October 10th, 2011 by Sarah

Chesapeake Research Consortium Staffers take a break from bird watching on a flooded pier to pose for a photo during an outing to Jug Bay Wetland Sanctuary.

Last week, Margaret Enloe, the Chesapeake Bay Program’s Communications Director, contributed an excellent guest blog about the impacts September’s flooding event had on the Bay.   Now that you understand some of the Bay dynamics that may have been influenced by the recent influx of water, sediment, nutrients, and contaminants, let’s examine how you can convey this information to your students.

Lesson Plans

Don’t worry; you are not up a flooded creek without a paddle. There is a wealth of lesson plans available to help you teach about flooding, many of which are aligned with national content standards!  Here are a few samples to help you get started:

  • Flood! – In this Discovery Education lesson plan, students in grades 6-8 will discover that different types of soil have different capacities for retaining rainwater. At the end of the lesson, they should also understand that if the soil in an area is already saturated with rainwater, flooding problems can ensue.
  • Floods: Rising Waters and You – 9-12 graders will investigate the relationships between human-made structures and flood waters in these PBS American Field Guide Lessons.
  • Flood! Classroom Activity – Students will construct a model of a river system and explore the use of manmade levees in this NOVA Teachers lesson plan.
  • Floods – Young students can learn about and play games related to floods on FEMA’s For Kids website.  Children can read “The River Rises; The Disaster Twins’ Flood Story,” take a flood math quiz, or play the “Water, Wind, and Earth Game.”
  • What is a Flood Plain? – Its not all science when if comes to flooding.  PBS has developed this lesson for 7-12 grade classrooms that wish to address content related to economics and/or geography.
  • Ancient Flood Stories – National Geographic has provided this lesson to help educators discuss the evidence that ancient floods may have helped to create the Black Sea. Students will practice their creative writing by composing stories about what it might have been like immediately before and during the flood.

On September 21, 2011 Chesapeake Research Consortium staffers hiked along the flooded Railroad Bed Trail in Jug Bay Wetland Sanctuary.

Ask a Scientist

Remember to end your flooding lesson by “bringing it local!” Discussing the impacts that September’s flooding had on the Chesapeake Bay, and on areas within the Chesapeake Bay Watershed, will provide your students with a real-world example that they have experienced.  Ask your students if their families took any steps to prepare for the flooding (see FEMA’s Flood website for helpful safety tips), or discuss what happened on school grounds.  This can help bring your flooding lesson to life, and ensure that it is relevant to your students.

Another great way to get your students interested in learning about floods and our local watershed is to have them interact with professionals who work in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math (STEM) related fields.  The Chesapeake Bay Program Partnership has many experts across the watershed who can answer your class’s emailed questions about the response of the streams, rivers and the Bay to the extreme rainfalls and flood conditions.  You can have your class assemble a list of their questions, and email them to us using this online form.  The Chesapeake Bay Program has experts on the following flooding-related topics:

  • River flow, flood conditions, loads of pollutants, comparison of other major flood events
  • Impacts of flood event on MD’s Bay waters and living resources
  • River monitoring in MD
  • Impacts of flood event on VA’s Bay waters and living resources
  • River monitoring in VA
  • River monitoring in PA
  • Monitoring in PA and New York
  • Overall watershed-wide effects and how CBP partners are monitoring the impacts
  • Data and info from NOAA Bay monitoring buoys, research vessels, and satellite imagery
  • Impacts on the Bay/other contacts in the watershed for more information
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Sarah Brzezinski works for the Chesapeake Research Consortium as the Chesapeake Bay Program's Fostering Stewardship and Education Workgroup Team Staffer. She also serves as the content manager of Bay Backpack.

Flooding in the Chesapeake Bay Watershed: Impacts on the Bay

October 3rd, 2011 by Margaret Enloe

During the flooding event on September 9, 2011, nutrients, sediment, garbage, and debris were washed downstream from the Susquehanna River into Chesapeake Bay at a near-record rate. Image courtesy of NASA Earth Observatory.

Near record flow of the Susquehanna River was measured by the USGS on the morning of Friday, September 9th. River flow at Conowingo Dam, where the river enters the Chesapeake Bay, was 775,000 cubic feet per second (CFS)!  2011 will most likely be one of the highest annual flow years on record for the Susquehanna River, primarily as a result of both the September tropical storms and a wet spring across the watershed.  In addition to the Susquehanna, high river flows were measured throughout other parts of the six-state Chesapeake Bay watershed. Your class can investigate real-time streamflow data at a site near your school by using the USGS WaterWatch website.

Likely Impacts on the Bay

Last month’s blog reported that the Chesapeake Bay received a short term water quality boost from Hurricane Irene due to the physical mixing of the Bay’s waters by extreme winds and waves that sent oxygen-rich surface waters into the deeper channels that are normally lacking oxygen at this time of year.  It is true that the physical mixing that resulted from Hurricane Irene did increase the amount of dissolved oxygen near the bottom of the Bay; however the shear magnitude of the more recent flood waters, combined with the loads of nutrients and sediments, will likely have a negative effect on the Bay’s health.  We will only understand the true impacts with the passage of time and through the combined monitoring and assessments by the Chesapeake Bay Program’s many partners.

Things to Watch:

  • Of potential concern to the next year’s crop of underwater bay grasses is the physical scouring of the Bay bottom (particularly in the Susquehanna Flats and the upper tidal Potomac River) resulting in the removal of vegetation living below the sediment surface—the ‘seeds’ for next spring’s plants.
  • The Bay’s oyster bars and other important hard bottom habitats will likely get a new layer of silt covering them in the coming days and weeks ahead, which will directly impact oyster and other bottom dwelling organisms.
  • Much of this sediment will stay around and, with the help of winds and tidal currents, find itself back up in the water column as early as this coming fall and well into the next year.
  • The flood of freshwater into a salty Bay can have impacts on the Bay’s critters like oysters which can’t just get up and move if the much lower salinity conditions last for an extended period of time.

Up on the Susquehanna River, the volume of flood waters will scour the bottom, causing sediment and nutrients previously ‘trapped’ behind the Conowingo Dam to be freed and sent down to the Bay.  These released sediments will likely bring not only more nutrients to the Bay, but also long-buried chemical contaminants.

USGS will be taking samples for analysis of bacteria, pesticides and trace metals over the course of the flood event to help understand the chemical contaminant loads entering the Bay from such a major flood event.  Several months from now we will be able to quantify these loads and the potential impact to a much higher degree.

Timing of the Floods Lessens the Opportunity for Further Impacts

When it comes to flood events and their impact on the health of local waterways and the Bay overall, it is timing that makes the big difference in terms of whether there is a short term (weeks to a month) or a long lasting (months to years) impact on the Bay ecosystem.  Based on historical data, we expect and will be monitoring the following:

  • Bay grasses: We are at the end of the underwater Bay grasses peak growing season, so impacts will be fewer than if the flooding occurred in June or July.
  • Living organisms in the Bay: As this is not a major spawning period for Bay living resources, the long term impact on their populations will be minimal.
  • Nutrients & sediment to the Bay: Given that this flood event is happening as the summer season comes to a close, there is less opportunity for long lasting water quality impacts in terms of nutrient and sediment pollution. By the spring, a majority of the nutrients should have worked their way through the Bay system.  Additionally, cooler temperatures, shorter days, reduced biological activity, and cloudy waters should prevent large algal blooms from growing in the excess nutrients.

Be sure to check in with Bay Backpack next week to learn how to teach about flooding in your classroom!

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Margaret Enloe is the Communications Director for the Chesapeake Bay Program / Alliance for the Chesapeake Bay.

Hurricane Irene and Water Quality Monitoring

September 19th, 2011 by Rich Batiuk

This graphic shows how the size of Hurricane Irene changed, and the areas that were potentially affected by sustained winds of tropical storm force (in orange) and hurricane force (in red). Image courtesy of the National Hurricane Center.

When it became clear that Hurricane Irene would move through the Bay region, the Chesapeake Bay Program’s (CBP) monitoring program coordinators, like Bruce Michael at Maryland’s Department of Natural Resources, adjusted the Bay water quality monitoring cruise schedules to get data just following the hurricane.

In the days following the hurricane, recent data from Maryland’s Eyes on the Bay program showed that the Bay received a short term water quality boost from the hurricane.  This is a result of the physical mixing of the Bay’s waters by extreme winds and waves that sent oxygen-rich surface waters into the deeper channels that are normally lacking oxygen at this time of year. Given the timing of this storm, the Bay likely dodged a potentially serious bullet thanks to Irene’s timing, rapid movement through the region, and track

However, we will still have to wait for weeks (mixing up of the water column with good oxygen levels; short term algal blooms), and really months (impact on the next spring’s algal blooms, early summer’s re-growth of underwater Bay grasses, and mid-summer’s dissolved oxygen conditions years), to fully answer the question, “What was the impact of Hurricane Irene (and even the fall 2011 hurricane season) on the Bay?”

Fortunately, the CBP partnership has an extensive monitoring program in place which continues to measure various indicators of the Bay’s health — in this case, prior to the hurricane and in the weeks and months following the storm.

For additional information on Hurricane Irene’s impact on the Chesapeake Bay, please refer to Rich’s complete article, “Impacts of Hurricane Irene on the Health of Chesapeake Bay? Only Time (and Monitoring) Will Tell!” featured on the Bay Blog.

In Your Classroom:

Your students may not be able to monitor the impacts of Hurricane Irene on the Chesapeake Bay, but they can conduct a smaller-scale research project by monitoring the water quality of a stream near your school!  Engaging your students in water quality monitoring can help them learn about pollution, local ecosystems, and stream health.  Have your science class or club monitor water temperature, air temperature, salinity, pH, dissolved oxygen, and Secchi Depth, and compare the results from different times of the year or before and after a storm to help them learn about factors that influence water quality.  National Geographic’s FieldScope, a web-based mapping, analysis, and collaboration tool that support geographic investigations, can help your students understand the data they collect.

For additional information on how to start a water quality monitoring program at your school and how to use the data you generate in your classroom, please refer to:

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Rich Batiuk is the Associate Director for Science with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency at the Chesapeake Bay Program.

How Does an Oyster Filter Water?

July 18th, 2011 by Sarah and Krissy

An adult oyster can filter up to 5 liters or 1.3 gallons on water an hour. That’s equal to 60 two-liter soda bottles a day, for just one oyster!  Historically, oysters could filter the Chesapeake Bay’s entire water volume in less than a week.  Today, with 1% of the oyster population left in the Chesapeake Bay, it would take oysters nearly a year.

So how do oysters do it?

Oysters are filter feeders, meaning they eat by pumping large volumes of water through their body.  Water is pumped over the oyster’s gills through the beating of cilia.  Plankton, algae and other particles become trapped in the mucus of the gills.  From there these particles are transported to the oyster esophagus and stomach to be eaten and digested.

Once the oyster removes all nutrients, indigestible material is expelled as “pseudofeces” through the anus.  The pseudofeces are expelled from the oyster’s shell via a rapid closing of valves. The expelled particles swirl through the water and resemble a smoke ring.  These smoke rings are an indication that oysters are filtering the water and doing what they are meant to do.

How Can I Teach About Oysters?

Now that you know a little bit about oysters and how they filter water, share the knowledge with your students! Here are some resources and lesson plans to help you do so:

  • Particulate Matters: Filtering Mechanism Laboratory – This dissection exercise from the Maryland Sea Grant utilizes dye to allow students to see how an oyster is able to filter materials from the environment and selectively process them as food or pseudofeces.
  • Hunting for Hemocytes: Forms Function, and Microscope Techniques – This lesson from the Maryland Sea Grant can be paired with the Particulate Matters lesson to expand on student microscope techniques and learn more about oysters.
  • Amazing Oyster – Younger students can learn about oysters through this lesson that helps them build a 3-D oyster pop-out reef!
  • Oystering on the Chesapeake Explorations 1-5 and Explorations 6-10 – Oystering on the Chesapeake, from the Chesapeake Bay Maritime Museum, offers teachers’ multi-disciplinary lesson plans to introduce students in grades 4 through 6 to the economic, environmental, and cultural significance of the oystering industry. Whatever lessons within the curriculum unit you choose, your students are sure to enjoy this exploration about the region’s oyster industry and the challenges facing the industry today.
  • Oysters and a Clear Bay – In this lesson, students will learn about the oyster population decline and regulations, and will try to “out-filter” an oyster in a lab activity.
  • Time-lapse: Oysters Filtering Water – This 44 second time-lapse video shows oysters filtering a tank of water.

Please refer to Bay Backpack’s searchable teacher resources section for more oyster-related lesson plans

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Sarah Brzezinski is the Chesapeake Bay Program's Fostering Stewardship and Education Workgroup Team Staffer. Krissy Hopkins is a former Chesapeake Bay Program Staffer and is currently pursuing her PhD in geology at the University of Pittsburgh.

Calling All Students: Help Save Our Streams

November 8th, 2010 by Leah

Students in the Save Our Streams program participate in monitoring of macroinvertebrates.

There’s nothing like seeing a kid’s eyes light up as they make the connection between their daily activities and the quality of their local waters – all while splashing in a stream and looking at the creepy, crawly critters found there. Equally as rewarding is seeing a child who doesn’t thrive in a traditional classroom become a leader in the outdoor classroom.

The Izaak Walton League’s Save Our Streams program trains students and adults to monitor water quality and restore their local streams. Save Our Streams volunteers test water quality by identifying macroinvertebrates living in the water. Stream-bottom macroinvertebrates — including aquatic insects (such as dragonfly and damselfly larvae) and crustaceans (such as crayfish, snails, and clams) — are good indicators of water quality because they live in the same area of a stream most of their lives and differ in their sensitivity to pollution.

Which macroinvertebrates you find, or don’t find, in a stream indicates the pollution level of the water. Biological monitoring is a quick, inexpensive and accurate way to find out if water quality is good or poor, and it gives volunteers a baseline for tracking changes in stream health.

State and local government agencies often use volunteer-collected data to identify pollution problems and track long-term trends in water quality. Local Izaak Walton League chapters and watershed associations use the information to identify and prioritize sites for restoration and to track restoration success. The data can also be used to influence local planning decisions to protect sensitive waterways, and better yet, students see that what they are doing in school matters in the real world.

Getting students and adults engaged in stream monitoring is also a great first step toward building a love of the outdoors and a conservation ethic. They understand that their actions can improve water quality, and they become more willing to change daily behaviors – such as practicing water-friendly lawn care – to do so.

How Can You Bring Water Quality Monitoring to Your Students?

Students use a seine net during an SOS outing.

The best way to start a Save Our Streams program with your students is to connect with a local Izaak Walton League chapter, watershed association, or government agency volunteer monitoring program. To find a program near you, e-mail the Izaak Walton League at sos@iwla.org or visit EPA’s Surf Your Watershed Web page.

You can also start your own water monitoring program – we’ll show you how. For information about training sessions, monitoring equipment, manuals, and other resources, visit the League’s Save Our Streams Web page.

Water Quality and Stream Ecology Resources

There are many great lesson plans and educational resources that can help you prepare students for a day on the stream. Here are a few to get you started:

  • The Izaak Walton League’s Project Watershed brings experienced program leaders together with middle school and high school students to engage classes in biological, chemical, and physical stream monitoring. Visit the program’s Web site for a wealth of lesson plans and other resources.
  • The Izaak Walton League’s Save Our Streams project idea page includes information about stream monitoring, organizing a watershed cleanup, and projects such as making rain barrels and rain gardens. For links to other educational resources, visit our Educational Programs page.
  • The Bureau of Land Management’s Holding onto the GREEN Zone Guide provides hands-on classroom activities for middle school students on stream ecology, the role of streamside buffers, water quality, and conservation careers. Indoor and outdoor activities are included.
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Leah Miller is the Clean Water Program Director at the Izaak Walton League of America, Inc. in Gaithersburg, Md.