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Welcome to the Explore the Salish Sea curriculum
Here is a culmination of seven workshops around the Salish Sea where marine educators, indigenous and western scientists, and classroom teachers shared lessons, activities, games, and pedagogy around learning science with the sea as our classroom and kids’ curiosity as our guide.
The curriculum is built upon our popular kids’ book, Explore the Salish Sea: A Nature Guide for Kids and supported by marine, estuarine, and watershed experts in your own community (find them in the map!).
To get a sense of the scope and sequence and see what you can customize to make it truly local, open the Unit Plan, Student Journal, and Slideshow for one unit and follow the Unit Plan steps.
Get set to experience the natural flow of place-based science as you get wet, ask questions, make hands-on observations, and solve mysteries and problems on our way to becoming “Salish Sea Heroes.” Let Explore the Salish Sea serve as a guide, a source of wonder and inspiration, and a springboard for putting science to work through the lens of the Salish Sea. As it turns out, by doing real science you meet science standards, every step of the way.
Before you launch:
Click the Curriculum Overview to get the big picture and science and traditional knowledge tips.
Register to access curriculum units.
Take your pre-curriculum teacher survey and administer your pre-curriculum student survey to your class
Curriculum Registration
Introduction
Southern Resident Killer Whale Taskforce
Curriculum Units
J50 “Scarlet,” with her mom, J16 “Slick” in 2015. Photo by NOAA Fisheries West Coast
Killer Whale Taskforce goes with the Introduction of Explore the Salish Sea, A Nature Guide for Kids. This unit introduces the overall phenomenon for the curriculum, the endangered status of the southern resident killer whales. Here students will form their overarching Essential Question that will guide and frame their explorations, authentic inquiries, and clue-finding missions along the way. This unit introduces the unique, rich, and fragile jewel in our own neighborhood: the Salish Sea, but also that this jewel needs our attention and action if the top predator in these waters is facing extinction. If we are to turn the fate of our Southern Resident Killer Whales around, we need to get to know our neighbors and their ecosystems and launch science- and Indigenous knowledge-based stewardship actions.
Chapter 1
Ocean Motion
The Orion, by Jess Newley
The ocean is the lungs of the earth. Physically, its circulation is responsible for our weather and climate and biologically, for most of the oxygen we breathe. Just how does the ocean circulate? Explore physical, chemical, and biological oceanography in this unit that scaffolds subsequent learning. Introduce or review basic concepts like states of matter, the water cycle, and effects of density differences on ocean circulation and on the oxygen-producing, food web-supporting drifters, the plankton.
Chapter 2
Stormwater
By Christopher Teren, Salish Sea in Focus
Stormwater runs down our gutters, sidewalks, streets, and parking lots, carrying with it all that is left on these impermeable surfaces into storm drains and into the sea. In this unit, review the water cycle, learn the parts of a watershed, and the effects of erosion and pollution, then learn ways of purifying these waters before they enter our streams and estuaries to safeguard these ecosystems for marine life and us.
Chapter 3
Salish Sea Rocks
Rocks only look still and lifeless. But if you could see a time lapse of their existence, you’d see them building up from eroded sediments and discarded shells, twisting and squishing from heat and pressure deep in the earth, then melting and oozing or blasting from volcanic eruptions, only to solidify and erode again. It’s the rock cycle and it is the supply of a rockstar lineup of rolling stones! Each change yields new types of rock and these come in all shapes, sizes, and a rainbow of colors. Next Generation Science Standards:
Part 1
Part 2
Chapter 4
Tide Out Table Set
Jan Kocian
In this unit students will solve a mystery about changes in oyster larvae in the Salish Sea, causing oyster farmers to send their larvae to Hawaii until they grow stronger. They will look for clues in activities and games, articles, and films that introduce the concept of habitat, structures and functions and behaviors for survival in intertidal zone habitats, the Earth-moon-sun interactions that drive the tides to create this unique zone, the importance of First Foods of the intertidal to first nations communities, and how specific intertidal organisms fit into the Salish Sea food web. They will conclude their detective work. Next Generation Science Standards:
Chapter 5
Ocean Tech
SeaDoc Science Director, Joe Gaydos, takes a closer look at the Oceangate submarine.
Chapter 5, Life in the Deep: The Subtidal World, is our first look into the amazing life forms that live their whole lives underwater. Is there access to the subtidal world near your school? If you can get to one (even if it is a pond or a pool), your students’ engineering efforts will find their reward. What mystery or problem will your students explore with their own ROV? Dive in!
Next Generation Science Standards-grade 5 (3-5-PS3-4 /3-5-ETS1-1 /3-5-ETS1-3)
Next Generation Science Standards-grades6-8 (MS-ESS2-1/MS-LS-4/MS-PS2-2/MS-ETS1-1/MS-ETS1-3)
Chapter 6
Dive!
Did you know that a elephant seal can hold its breath for 77 min and dive 5,000 feet in the sea? We are still working on the science to discover just what enables these remarkable feats under intense pressure, cold, and dark. Diving birds and mammals utilize physical, behavioral, and physiological adaptations to withstand the extreme conditions of diving and still return to the surface with a meal and oxygen reserves. Your students can join us in investigating just how they do this.
David Hicks
Chapter 7
Migration
Migration explores the routes, distances, and purposes for wildlife migration with a special focus on Pacific salmon. This iconic species of the Pacific Northwest has shaped life in Salish Sea watersheds since they first entered rivers and creeks to spawn, bringing their ocean-derived nutrients in reach of land animals, plants, and people. Nearly 1/4 of the nitrogen in the leaves of our giant temperate rainforest trees once swam in the sea in salmon. They are the reason for the great natural wealth of the Salish Sea and beyond.
Next Generation Science Standards Grade 5
Next Generation Science Standards Grade 8
Florian Graner
Chapter 8
Salish Sea Heroes
The culmination of the Explore the Salish Sea Curriculum is improving the environment in and for your own community. Students will review the science and traditional ecological knowledge-based recommendations they have made with each scientific investigation they have made throughout their explorations, then choose one to take action upon. Their choices will depend on available resources, time, and expertise available…
Julie Picardi
Salish Sea Splash
An 8-10 day, student-guided exploration of Explore the Salish Sea
Even just a glimpse beneath the surface reveals a bewildering wildlife and geologic wonderland and ample opportunity for earth, physical, and biological investigation. We are offering this shorter option to explore the Salish Sea in response to teachers who want to get their students’ toes wet in place-based science, but may not have room for a longer unit.
Like our full curriculum, Splash starts with wonder, follows the chapters of Explore the Salish Sea, A Nature Guide for Kids, and ends with sharing discoveries with the community, all in alignment with science standards. Unlike our full curriculum, here the students take the helm and teach one another, learning a whole lot in the process, while you are the guide on the side.
Next Generations Science Standards are included in games and activities that students may select to lead in this unit.
By Jan Kocian