TENFEE Environmental Literacy Plan UW-Superior Lorena M Rios
Teaching Context: Timeframe: Fall-2020 Audience: Undergraduate students non-science majors | Abstract: This resource is intended to engage undergraduate students in non-science majors by their participation in a citizen-science project |
Institution: University of Wisconsin-Superior | Author(s): Lorena M Rios Mendoza lriosmen@uwsuper.edu |
Current Status of Environmental Literacy and Sustainability Preparation: Strand 3: Engage. Standards 6 and 7. The course “Chemistry of Everyday Phenomena” is a course where students are engaged with chemistry, their environment and develop skills for responsibility for their decisions and actions that affect the environment. UW-Superior has a commitment to prepare undergraduate students in environmental courses, such as Chem-102 (lecture and laboratory experience) to enable students to understand our natural environment and the effects of human interactions on it. The lab experience enables students to understand the nature of science and apply scientific method through hands-on experiences. | |
Evidence of Need: Our campus is using a lot of single use plastic items, this is an example how the education in environmental and sustainability is low. | Evidence of Success: Students will explain how chemistry affects his/her everyday lives and society Students will be able to understand risks/benefits to take decisions about chemical use and exposure. Students will be able to conceptualize chemistry science and its methods. |
Action plan to revise, improve, or integrate inquiry-based environmental education: Class projects such as plastic pollution Invite guest speaker (EPA or LSNERR) Discussion on a topic and detect the environmental issue and suggest possible solutions Develop activities in our campus, e.g. plastic debris (environmental and sustainability concepts) Beach Cleanup International Event (student and community engagement) | |
In what ways will you address Wisconsin Standards for Environmental Literacy and Sustainability Standards Addressed (Full Document or searchable spreadsheet)? Engage: Systems-thinking skills learning priorities: rights and responsibilities, model of sustainability and inquiry and investigation. | |
Consider the following items and incorporate those that are appropriate to address the actions above: 1)Lesson plans and assessments Keep a journal for a week and save all the plastic items used 2) Steps to implement and evaluate their plan In class do all the classification of the plastic items and do the math to calculate the concentration of plastic garbage produced by a student, class, UWS campus, state (WI), country (USA) and world. 3) Local outdoor learning sites St Louis River Estuary and Lake Superior 4) Professional development resources Attended Natural Science Capstone presentations | |