The Delaware National Estuarine Research Reserve offers Teacher Professional Development opportunities through various programs including Green Eggs & Sand, Estuaries 101, and Project WET (Water Education for Teachers).
Green Eggs & Sand:
Green Eggs & Sand is an innovative workshop experience and set of curriculum modules designed to explore the Atlantic Coast horseshoe crab (HSC)/shorebird phenomenon and management controversy. The first workshop was launched in the spring of 2000 by aquatic education specialists from Delaware, Maryland and New Jersey in response to the escalating HSC management controversy on Delaware Bay. Many of the teachers participating in that inaugural workshop stayed on to help write, pilot and implement the lessons that form the heart of the GE&S curriculum. In the years since, interest in HSCs and GE&S has spawned workshops up and down the coast, serving educators from 19 states and 2 foreign countries.
Next Workshop: Spring 2010
Estuaries 101:
Estuaries 101 is a curriculum which will be used by National Estuarine Research Reserve education staff and teachers throughout the nation to help students become more oceans literate by increasing their knowledge of coastal and estuarine science and their awareness of how coasts and oceans affect their daily lives. Estuaries 101 will be organized and developed in four parts: K-2, 3-5, 6-8 and 9-12 grades. The 9-12 curriculum is the first phase of Estuaries 101 and was finalized in Spring 2008.
Next Workshop: TBD
Project WET (Water Education for Teachers):
Project WET (Water Education for Teachers) is a nonprofit water education program and publisher for educators and young people ages 5-18. The program facilitates and promotes awareness, appreciation, knowledge, and stewardship of water resources through the dissemination of classroom-ready teaching aids and the establishment of internationally sponsored Project WET programs.
Next Workshop: TBD
For more information on what Teacher Professional Development opportunities the Delaware National Estuarine Research Reserve provides, please contact Jennifer Holmes, Education Coordinator at (302) 739-3436 or jennifer.holmes@state.de.us
