Going Green on the Elementary School Scene: Elementary School Curriculum Carolyn Foster, Olivia Janson, Danika Jones, Alexa Rakoski, Amy Siebenthaler

Camas High School Math , Science, and Technology Magnet Program

Through this curriculum we educated third graders about many different environmentally prevalent issues at a level that the students will be able to easily understand. In the beginning, we gave the students a placement test to find out how much they already knew about each topic we planned to teach. Through question and answer, hands on work, and art projects we taught students how they can benefit the world. At the end of the curriculum we gave an identical test to see how much information the students were able to retain, so that they could implement their learning at home and as they grow. After testing our curriculum and taking data we presented our findings to the Camas School District for consideration as a permanent science curriculum in the elementary schools.

On the pre-test, scored out of 12 points, students scored an average of 8.158 points, ranging from scores of 5 out of 12 to 12 out of 12. The median score was 9 points out of 12, and the majority of people scored between 8 and 11 points out of 12. Students commonly missed the questions about composting practices and use of alternative light bulbs such as compact fluorescent light bulbs (CFLs).

Abstract Results

Objectives

Future Work

Our main objective is to excite elementary school children about helping and respecting the environment through a fun, educational, and hands on "going green" curriculum. Through our research, we found that it is much easier to instill beneficial habits at a young age than to try and break harmful habits later. Therefore, in our efforts to help create a new generation of environmentally gracious people, we want students to establish a positive relationship with the environment at a young age that they can carry with them throughout their life. In addition, we hope to permanently implement the curriculum in the Camas School District, so generations to come will benefit from it as well.

(2007 March). Environmental Education. Retrieved November 20, 2008, from Sierra Club Web site: http://www.sierraclub.org/education/ Cooney, Dr. T. (1995). Energy Education Curriculum Project. Retrieved November 20, 2008, from University of Northern Iowa Web site: http://www.uni.edu/earth/EECP/elem/mod3_sciact.html Ferris, J. (1996). Energy Education Curriculum Program. Retrieved November 20, 2008, from the Texas State Energy Conservation Office (SECO) Web site: http://www.seco.cpa.state.tx.us/energy-ed_curriculum.htm The Green Team Compost Lesson. Retrieved January 10, 2009 from the State of Massachusetts Green Teach Web Site: http://www.thegreenteam.org/index.html Haines, Sarah and Kilpatrick, Cynthia. (Apr./May 2007). Environmental Education Saves the Day. Science and Children, 44, Retrieved Feb. 5, 2009, from http://proquest.umi.com/ Wilson, R. A. (1996). Starting early: Environmental education during the early childhood years. ERIC Digest. Retrieved November 19, 2008 from: http://www.ericdigests.org/19981/early.htm

References

Methods

Analysis

Conclusion

Acknowledgements

Thank you to the Camas School District as a whole for their support of our project through the Magnet Program and implementing the curriculum. Special thanks to Sharon Rakoski, the third grade teacher from Prune Hill Elementary who provided her classroom and students for the project. Thank you to Julie Swan, principal of Prune Hill Elementary for allowing us to test the curriculum in the school. Also, thank you to Mike Nerland, superintendant of the Camas School District for supporting our project and considering implementing the curriculum in the district. Finally, we would like to extend our gratitude to New Seasons Market and Clark Public Utilities for donating materials for the project.

Figure 1. This illustrates the scores of all the students on the test taken before the experiment was conducted. The bars of the graph form a slight bell curve over which the students seem to be nearly equally distributed.

Figure 2. This is a representation of students’ scores on the test taken after the experiment was conducted. The curve is not a bell curve but is instead exponential with a concentration of students at the high score end of the graph.

The question we investigated was “How much can we increase young students’ awareness of environmentally friendly practices by teaching them through a school curriculum?” In response to this question, we hypothesized that if we implemented our curriculum in an elementary school classroom, then the students would understand environmental issues and be able to remember and implement the solutions we teach them.

In order to accomplish this, we first wrote an original curriculum, though it was based on existing curricula from other states such as Texas or Massachusetts. We were assisted by Sharon Rakoski, a third grade teacher who also has experience in curriculum formation. Then we taught the lessons in Sharon Rakoski’s third grade classroom by first giving the students a multiple choice pre-test covering major topics taught in our curriculum, including composting, recycling, home practices, and alternative energy sources. The next step was to teach the curriculum, in lessons of about half hour duration twice a week. After completing the curriculum, the students took the same test as before the curriculum to measured how much knowledge they gained.

In the future we hope that the curriculum that we designed will be incorporated into the third grade curriculum in our school district. We have already begun working on accomplishing this goal by meeting with Superintendent Mike Nerland and presenting our curriculum to him. He agreed to set up a meeting for us to tell all the elementary school principals about our project as well. Hopefully, we will be able to take our curriculum further so that schools in Washington and all over the country can use it to teach their students what they can do to make the world a better place.

The graph of the pre-test is in the shape of a bell curve, indicating that the students were at an average level for the pretest. Some knew more than others, possibly because of practicing or discussing environmentally friendly practices and alternative energy sources at home. Comparing the pre-test graph to that of the post test, it is clear that the students improved immensely. All the data is concentrated exponentially at the high end of the scale, except for the outlier. The student who scored 4 out of 12, however, is designated as a special education student with focus issues, likely contributing to his score. Since the idea of curricula is to obtain end results similar to these—with most students concentrated at the upper end of the learning scale, an occurrence of this indicates that the curriculum was successful.

From completing the study, we learned that a curriculum regarding alternative energy is extremely beneficial to elementary school students. Additionally, the curriculum excites children about making a difference individually through practices such as turning off the lights or keeping a compost pile at their homes. Though the curriculum still has room for improvement, it was successful for the most part in one third grade classroom at Prune Hill Elementary, causing students to receive generally high scores on their post tests for the study. Because of the success of the curriculum, we plan to implement it district-wide, in the county, and finally throughout the state so that it can benefit children and their families everywhere in Washington.

After teaching the curriculum, we gave the students a post test. The test resulted in overall higher scores, with one outlier. The average score, without the outlier, was 11.19 points out of 12, and the median and mode scores were both 12 out of 12. Even so, some questions were commonly missed, such as one about composting and one about the benefits of buying food locally.