September STEM Theme: we all live in a watershed

The September STEM theme is a monthly installment of the California Afterschool Network STEM in Out-of-School Time Initiative. In this monthly initiative, access resources from the California Coastal Commission's Coastal Cleanup Day and World Water Monitoring Day to engage youth in after school programs in engaging educational experiences around water, water quality, and healthy water systems. You can offer regular lessons in the context of your program and extend lessons with a service-learning component. A watershed is the area of land that drains to a common waterway (i.e. river, creek, wetland, ocean), and we all live in a watershed. Locate your watershed, access to lessons and activities below to learn with your students about the importance of water quality and watershed health, learn about the quality of your local waterway, and participate in cleanup activities. How to get involved For more information, join an informational webinar on September 7, 2011 from 10:00a.m. - 11:30a.m. This webinar will feature Annie Kohut Frankel, Education Coordinator for the California Coastal Commission and will outline general information about the September STEM theme and detailed instructions and suggestions on how to implement this theme into your program. Learn more and participate in this webinar If you have any questions, contact Jeff Davis at jefdavis@ucdavis.edu or call him at 530-752-5965. What to do It is really up to you what you do! You may want to access a free educator guide and implement a few lessons this month in your program. That may be all you do, but if you are able and or you may expand upon the lessons taught in your program by testing the water quality of a local waterway and entering your data into an international database, and then participate in an international initiative to clean up our waterways (Coastal Cleanup Day).

1. Access free lessons from Coastal Cleanup Day and World Water Monitoring Day (See suggested lessons below)
2. Plan, and gather any necessary materials to implement lessons in your program schedule (for example, ensure you have necessary materials to implement a lesson, order water quality monitoring kits, connect with your local Coastal Cleanup Day Representative, etc.)
3. Implement lessons in your program
4. Test the water quality of a local waterway using World Water Monitoring Day water quality test kits (cost = $25.00 per kit) and enter your data into an international database of citizens monitoring water quality.
5. Participate in Coastal Cleanup Day (consistent with grant compliance). Regional Coastal Cleanup Day events will be hosted on Saturday September 17, 2011 from 9am - noon, at beaches, rivers, and creeks throughout all of California. Some Coastal Cleanup day local coordinators will help you organize a clean-up at or near your program site, either on Saturday or on Friday September 16.

Coastal Cleanup Day Resources

• Learn all about Coastal Cleanup Day
• Watch a 9 minute video about plastic in our oceans for some background information (video posted by the Algalita Marine Resource Foundation)
• Access the Educator's resource page and scroll to the bottom of the page to view suggested activities, or download entire curriculum guides and choose the activities best for your program.
• Locate and contact your local coordinator to learn about potential site-based projects or how to get involved in community cleanup efforts.

World Water Monitoring Day Resources

• Learn all about World Water Monitoring Day
• Access resources on how to test water quality and what your results mean
• Register your program and it's testing site and order test kits. One basic test kit costs $13.00 and one classroom kit costs $49.00. Each comes with vials for testing water quality. One basic kit would serve 8-10 students if 2 students were paired together to test each water quality indicator (i.e. ph, temperature, oxygen). Utilize this information in purchasing one or more basic test kits, or a classroom kit that will serve 30-40 students.
• Test water quality at a local waterway by both searching for and identifying living things in the waterway and conducting chemical tests.
• After testing the water quality, upload your data to the international World Water Monitoring Day website.