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.
Upcoming Workshops:
Friday - Sunday May 4-6, University of Georgia Marine Education Center & Aquarium
Contact: Dodie Sanders, sandersd@uga.edu
Friday - Sunday May 18-20, DE Aquatic Resources Education Center, Smyrna, DE.
Contact: Gary Kreamer, gary.kreamer@state.de.us
Friday - Sunday June 1-3, Mass. Audubon Wellfleet Bay Wildlife
Contact: Amy Fleischer, afleischer@massaudbon.org
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.
NEW! There is exciting news at Project WET! The new version of the Project WET guide was released in September and the new on-line portal was released in late November. That is correct…there is a brand new guide with new activities and updates to existing activities!! There will be 2.5 hour refresher trainings and 6-hour educator trainings coming up this spring! There will be a small fee per person of $21.00 (covers the cost of training materials including the guide). If it has been more than 5 years since you have participated in a training and you have not used the curriculum in years, we ask that you take a full 6-hour training.
Refresher 2.5 hour Training Dates (add an extra 15 minutes to the times if you are a facilitator):
March 21 9 - 11:30 a.m. (11:45) or 1 - 3:30 p.m. (3:45) St. Jones Reserve, Dover, DE - Cancelled due to low registration.
April 24 9 - 11:30 a.m. (11:45) or 1 -3:30 p.m. (3:45) Blackbird Creek Reserve, Townsend, DE
6-Hour Workshop (for new Project WET Educators and those who have not been trained in over 5 years)
April 13 9 a.m. - 3 p.m. St. Jones Reserve, Dover, DE
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
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
