Embedded Files
SPRING 2021
Local Problem/Issue: Natural Bridges State Beach used to host thousands of Monarchs each winter. In the last few years, those numbers have dropped dramatically. When 2nd grade students went to Natural Bridges for a field trip last year, we saw less than 10 monarchs! Save the butterflies! We will focus on built landscape, humans, and global warming as major obstacles to pollinators and native plants. We will use the monarch butterfly and the milkweed it depends on as a case study.
Students will begin by building background knowledge about native plants, insects, and pollination through a monarch butterfly case study. The entry event will be a virtual field trip to Natural Bridges State Beach. After studying the monarch butterfly and its current challenges due to built landscape and loss of the milkweed it needs, students will research and take action to care for local pollinators. Students will design a solution for the too-built landscape situation on our campus, take home potted native wildflowers, and share calls-to-action with community members.
There are planter boxes in front of our classroom at school that are full of trash and weeds. After they have built background knowledge on the importance of native plants and pollinators and the problem of built landscape, students will observe the planter boxes in their current state and design a solution that works towards both campus beautification and caring for pollinators. Students will also have the chance to take their solutionary visions into their own neighborhoods by planting a few seeds in a decorated pot to start a pollinator garden at home. The pots will be decorated with an artistic depiction of students’ call to action. The written calls-to-action will be opinion pieces on why it is important to care for pollinators and how to do so.
The culminating solutionary challenge for this project has two parts - a hands on service learning component and a written call to action. Students will practice being solutionaries and engage in service learning by deciding how to fix the lack of pollinator-friendly spaces on our campus. Students’ writing will be the main evidence of their learning. Their calls-to-action will showcase the background research they built on land based ecosystems (specifically on California pollinators and native plants, and the challenges that built landscape, humans, and global warming present to them). The calls-to-action will also showcase the solutionary mindsets that students develop through this project and give them a platform to inspire their community with them.
The calls-to-action that students publish and showcase through art on the flower pots will educate and inspire community members about caring for pollinators as well. In addition, through studying local plants and pollinators, students will become more aware of their place as human members of an ecological community. They will develop empathy as they learn about the challenges pollinators face, and learn empowerment as they design solutions and call on others to take action as well.
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