Trying Out The New England Landscape Futures Explorer
Day 2 Our Changing Forests Schoolyard Eco Summer Institute for Teachers
Digging Deeper into engaging students in exploring possibilities of what our future landscape will look like
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Josh Plisinski from Harvard Forest's Future Scenarios Research team shared an overviewof the New England Landscape Futures (NELF) online tool that allows users to see possiblefuture change in our landscape based on four possible scenarios. |
Three Our Changing Forests project teachers were awarded Schoolyard Ecology mini grants* to develop, pilot and present educational activities that integrate the NELF tool into classroom activities designed for Schoolyard Ecology students participating in the Changing Forests field activities led by Harvard Forest Ecology and Education teams.
These presentations attracted a wide audience
of both new and experienced Changing Forest teachers, who are considering what of this
educational content they might be able to use
in their own classrooms.
Educators in the audience had a chance to try out the new activities at the workshop.
Links to New England Landscape Futures Resources:
Landscape Future-Scenarios Research at Harvard Forest
New teachers to the OCF project
were able to learn how to interpret
the laminated land cover change map series they were provided to help students see how the
landscape at their schools and towns changed
since 1985.
Harvard Forest staff were able to help mentor educators as they
played with the NELF tool to complete the teacher-developed
activities.
What Teachers Said was Most Valuable:
The NELF software and its functionalities was the greatest take away. The envirothon kids will be able to use this tool most effectively in the immediate school year.
The NELF tool is very exciting. I hope to teach others in my field about it and use it to structure the way we think about conservation and education!
exciting use of technology and application
Using NELF Explorer to study landscape changes over time
Being able to receive the lessons to edit ourselves.
As my first time diving into NELF, I see how to use this with my classes ... Teacher lessons!
How to specifically use the NELFS with my 7th graders to graph and visualize possible scenarios for influencing their future
different approaches to using known tools and introduction of new tools
Networking with like-minded teachers and having the chance to brainstorm how to implement this tool- and others!
New resources, NELF, ArcGIS, Tableau See teacher presentations using this information
How to use NELF explorer in the context of the classroom, how to use data to show how forests are changing
Links to Teacher-Developed Education Activities using NELF Explorer:
Lesson Plan and Related Documents by Joe Scanio, Choate-Rosemary Hall School:
Lesson Plan by Jeff Sautter, Athol-Royalston Middle School
Lesson Plan and Handouts by Tara Alcorn, Greater Lowell Technical High School
Changing Forests Land Cover Change Maps:
* Funding for the Our Changing Forests Mini Grants for Teachers was provided by the Highstead Foundation
