This is what Schoolyard Eco Looks Like from Westwood to Westfield

Don't you love it when you have students who help do your job for you?!!

I definitely do...and in this case, it is Schoolyard Teachers doing my work for me...giving me ways of showing what Schoolyard Ecology looks like on school grounds  and in the classroom.

Many thanks to teachers, Michael McCarthy from Thurston Middle School in Westwood and Mary Reed at St. Mary's Parish School in Westfield for sharing these views! 

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Michael has put together a wonderful combination of images and links related to the 2 Schoolyard Projects he leads in Westwood.  

I  love the way he put it all together and so I have cut and pasted it all and provided you the link to his site below.  

 To see this in larger and original form, check out Michael's  class web page online at:  Westwoodmccarthy-science/project-bud-burst-2018

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Schoolyard Teacher, Mary Reed, sent me a "care package" that I want to share with you. 

  This is some of the contents I received in a large manila envelope via snail mail from the  Saint Mary's Parish School in Westfield:  

Sample student graph of  Tree Color and Leaf Drop

Completed Worksheet focusing on Research questions of the Buds, Leaves and Global Warming  project.  This worksheet embedded the Julian Date Calendar on it to make it easy and concrete for students to do this calculation successfully.  

Here is a closer look at a student response to the more open ended question about the growing season.  Notice that this is an important way to see what students understand and specifically where misconceptions lie.  I highly recommend using both concrete growing season question and this open ended one as Mary did to scaffold  and  develop student  understanding and to assess what was understood and what wasn't.  

Mary Sent these photos separately
 to contribute to the field site
database.  

 

 This is a graph Mary created during the Data Workshop for Teachers at Harvard Forest which shows the species composition of her schoolyard field site in a different way than the photos.

 Explore More:

Find and download Buds project Graphing Templates and Summary Questions by Mary Reed for use in your classroom at:  Elementary-Buds-Graphing.pdf

See Project Data from these sites on our database by clicking on their locations on our  Interactive Schoolyard Site Map

See what more teachers  throughout the region shared about projects at their individual schools on our Lightning Round Slide Presentation at: Lightning Round-4-6-18.pptx