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To recognize this special day, Education World offers original lesson plans that will engage students in creating maps of an astronaut's view of Earth, exploring issues of junk mail and hazardous household waste, and learning about endangered species. Included: Student work sheet, 20 bonus Earth Day lessons, plus links to fun Earth Day resources for kids!
What are you doing to celebrate Earth Day? Following are a handful of ways in which some teachers are planning to recognize Earth Day:
Participating in the Global Sun/Temperature Project
Learning How to Make Your Own Recycled Paper
Growing Plants from Cuttings to raise money for school programs
Joining thousands of other school kids in the Earth Day Groceries Project
Having students carry a trash bag to hold their school trash for a week
Posting the Earth Science Picture of the Day around a world map
Those are just a few of the educational -- and fun -- ideas Education World offers this week. Read on to find five fabulous original lessons from the Ed World editors plus 20 bonus Earth Day lesson plans and a handful of Earth Day sites that are just plain fun!
From the Ed World Archives
Searching for other Earth Day lessons and resources? Don't miss Education World's special Earth Day Archive.
FIVE LESSON PLANS FOR CELEBRATING EARTH DAY
Click each of the five lesson plan headlines below for a complete teaching resource. (Approximate grade levels for each lesson are indicated in parentheses.)
Earth from Space Maps
Help students use photo images from space to create a large map of the United States or the world, find where they live, and label other places they know. (Grades 3-12)
Junk Mail Overload
Ask students to track the amount of junk mail received at home in one week. They can use collected data to estimate how much junk mail accumulates in a year and explore ways to solve the junk mail problem. (Grades 3-12)
Clean Up Hazardous Waste
Students identify sources of home hazardous waste and create posters to educate community members about how to handle that waste. (Grades 3-12)
ABCs of Endangered Species
A student-created ABC Book of Endangered Animals includes locator maps, "fast facts," and explanations about why those animals are endangered. (Grades K-8)
101 Amazing Earth Facts
Play this Jeopardy-style game in your classroom; or make it a school-wide competition. (Grades 4-12)
BONUS EARTH DAY LESSON PLANS!
Education World editors searched the Internet for great Earth Day lesson ideas. You'll find a few of our fabulous finds in the introduction to this article. You'll find more than a dozen more below!
Observing the Effects of Acid Rain on Plant Growth (Grades 3-12)
The Imagination Factory's Art Projects from Trash (Grades K-12)
Looking at Acid's Effects on Metal (Grades 3-12)
Environmental Event: Earth Day Activities (Grades K-12)
The Lorax by Dr. Seuss -- Cyber Teacher's Guide (Grades K-2)
Tending to the Greenhouse: Examining Causes, Effects, and Solutions for Global Warming (Grades 6-12)
Acid Rain Collaborative Project (Spring 2002) (Grades 5-12)
MORE EARTH DAY SITES -- JUST FOR FUN!
Following are a handful of Earth Day games and other activities that are available on the Web. They offer fun for kids of all ages!
The Lorax's Save the Trees Game
The game requires Shockwave plug-in.
Earth Day Concentration Puzzle
This puzzle requires Java plug-in.
Earth Day Word Searches
Find puzzles at four levels, from beginner to super difficult.
Happy Earth Day Coloring and Activities Book
Download a .pdf version (Adobe Acrobat required) of this learning activities book from the EPA.
Earth Day Online Games
Link to more than 30 games.
SeaWorld Teacher's Guides
Developed at SeaWorld and Busch Gardens to help you teach your students - in an active, hands-on way - about how people interact with the environment and how we can best care for Earth's resources.
Wild Places
Learn about all about endangered animals across the world.
Article by Gary Hopkins
Education World®
Copyright © 2010 Education World
Originally published 04/5/2002
Last updated 03/19/2010
April Every-Day Edits
Use Every-Day Edits to build language skills, test scores, and cultural literacy. Be sure to see our tips for using Every-Day Edits in your classroom.
Pysanky: Ukrainian Easter EggsHatching ChicksWorld's Largest and Smallest PlantsArbor DayGardening FunSpringtime on the FarmNational Cherry Blossom FestivalSpring Is HereApril ShowersThe Apple II Personal ComputerAmerica's First Earth DayBaseball Season Then and NowNational Poetry MonthWilliam ShakespeareWhite House Easter Egg RollJane Goodall Maya AngelouBooker T. WashingtonModern Olympic GamesMars OdysseySurrender at AppomattoxUgandaThe Big WindAnne SullivanMcDonald'sIqbal Masih, Child ActivistNew Jersey, “The Garden State”Yankee Stadium S.E. Hinton, AuthorPresident James BuchananTheodore Roosevelt National ParkMadelineDuke Ellington
Looking for ideas for using Every-Day Edits in your classroom? See our idea file.
Run out of Every-Day Edit activities for the month of April? Check out our Xtra activities for any time of year.
Students may greet you with groans and moans when you assign a poem to memorize, but the following round-up of worthy lines are sure to stick with them for a lifetime.
Brad Leithauser wrote “Why We Should Memorize” for The New Yorker, wrote: “The best argument for verse memorization may be that it provides us with knowledge of a qualitatively and physiologically different variety: you take the poem inside you, into your brain chemistry if not your blood, and you know it at a deeper, bodily level than if you simply read it off a screen. Robson puts the point succinctly: “If we do not learn by heart, the heart does not feel the rhythms of poetry as echoes or variations of its own insistent beat.”
This sentiment still might not convince a teenager of the importance of memorizing one of Shakespeare’s sonnets, but it will dawn on them, one day. These five poems span all grade levels and difficulties, coming from some of the most famous poets in history.
1. The Road Not Taken
Poet: Robert Frost
Grade Level: 7-12
Difficulty: Hard
Two roads diverged in a yellow wood, And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth; Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim Because it was grassy and wanted wear,
Though as for that the passing there Had worn them really about the same,
And both that morning equally lay In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way I doubted if I should ever come back.
I shall be telling this with a sigh Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I, I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.
2. Sonnet 18
Poet: William Shakespeare
Grade Level: 6-12
Difficulty: Medium
Shall I compare thee to a Summer’s day? Thou art more lovely and more temperate:
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May, And Summer’s lease hath all too short a date:
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines, And oft’ is his gold complexion dimm’d;
And every fair from fair sometime declines, By chance or nature’s changing course untrimm’d:
But thy eternal Summer shall not fade Nor lose possession of that fair thou owest;
Nor shall Death brag thou wanderest in his shade, When in eternal lines to time thou growest:
So long as men can breathe, or eyes can see, So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.
3. I’m Nobody! Who Are You?
Poet: Emily Dickinson
Grade Level: 6-12
Difficulty: Easy
I’m Nobody! Who are you? Are you – Nobody – too?
Then there’s a pair of us!
Don’t tell! they’d advertise – you know!
How dreary – to be – Somebody!
How public – like a Frog – To tell one’s name
– the livelong June – To an admiring Bog!
4. Dentist and the Crocodile
Poet: Roald Dahl
Grade Level: 3-5
Difficulty: Medium
The crocodile, with cunning smile, sat in the dentist's chair.
He said, "Right here and everywhere my teeth require repair."
The dentist's face was turning white. He quivered, quaked and shook.
He muttered, "I suppose I'm going to have to take a look."
"I want you," Crocodile declared, "to do the back ones first.
The molars at the very back are easily the worst."
He opened wide his massive jaws. It was a fearsome sight––
At least three hundred pointed teeth, all sharp and shining white.
The dentist kept himself well clear. He stood two yards away.
He chose the longest probe he had to search out the decay.
"I said to do the back ones first!" the Crocodile called out.
"You're much too far away, dear sir, to see what you're about.
To do the back ones properly you've got to put your head
Deep down inside my great big mouth," the grinning Crocky said.
The poor old dentist wrung his hands and, weeping in despair, He cried,
"No no! I see them all extremely well from here!" Just then, in burst a lady, in her hands a golden chain.
She cried, "Oh Croc, you naughty boy, you're playing tricks again!"
"Watch out!" the dentist shrieked and started climbing up the wall.
"He's after me! He's after you! He's going to eat us all!"
"Don't be a twit," the lady said, and flashed a gorgeous smile.
"He's harmless. He's my little pet, my lovely crocodile."
5. Invitation
Poet: Shel Silverstein
Grade Level: K-12
Difficulty: Easy
If you are a dreamer, come in,
If you are a dreamer, a wisher, a liar,
A hope-er, a pray-er, a magic bean buyer…
If you’re a pretender, come sit by my fire
For we have some flax-golden tales to spin.
Come in!
Come in!
Compiled by Samantha DiMauro, Education World Contributor
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