The odyssey continues. The St. Johns River Water Management District (SJRWMD) is currently scheduling educator workshops for its third-grade curriculum and pilot testing for the fourth-grade curriculum is being completed. Pilot testing of the fifth-grade curriculum will begin October 22. If you would like to register for a workshop or have one scheduled for your school, contact Barbra Siebert at (386) 329-3839, siebertb@nefec.org, or go to http://www.sjrwmd.com/education and click on the Odyssey link. If you are interested in pilot testing fifth grade, contact Barbra Seibert.

The Great Water Odyssey^SM is an interactive, multidisciplinary educational experience, available free of charge to educators within SJRWMD’s 18-county service area.

The Great Water Odyssey^SM:

• Introduces students to the world of water through an interactive, animated curriculum
• Features cartoon animation with friendly characters, voices and music
• Teaches about multiple subjects, including reading, history, geography, math, social studies and science
• Employs and enhances critical thinking skills
• Correlates to Sunshine State Standards (SSS) and provides Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test (FCAT) practice questions
• Includes stories to read and fun, challenging quizzes to monitor students’ progress
• Includes educators’ manual with teaching suggestions, background information, learning and reading extensions.

A new online educational product developed by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) National Ocean Service is now available on the Web. This new kit explains the science of estuaries, which are some of the most productive ecosystems in the world. The kit joins three other discovery kits - corals, tides and water levels, and geodesy (the science of measuring and monitoring the size and shape of the earth and the location of points on its surface). Information about the kits can be found at http://www.nos.noaa.gov/education/kits/estuaries/welcome.html.

The North East Florida Educational Consortium (NEFEC) has strengthened its partnership with SJRWMD. Under contract with SJRWMD, NEFEC is assisting with scheduling, advertising, and conducting Project WET educator workshops and responding to requests for SJRWMD education programs with the assistance of Watershed Action Volunteer (WAV) coordinators and volunteers. NEFEC is also assisting with the development of the teacher training and support materials for The Great Water Odyssey^SM.

Barbra Siebert, siebertb@nefec.org, can be contacted with questions relating to The Great Water Odyssey^SM and Project WET, as well as with scheduling a presentation at your school or club.

Most people know that to protect the environment they should recycle more, water their lawn less, get out of the car, and take a multitude of other steps to reduce their ecological footprint. But as often as not, the actions people take are not consistent with what they know to be true about the state of the environment. In fact, research demonstrates that simply providing information usually has little or no effect on what people do. But if not brochures, then what?

Over the last several years, a new approach - community-based social marketing - has emerged as an attractive alternative for delivering programs to change environmental behavior. The Fostering Sustainable Behavior Web site was created to help those who design environmental programs; visit http://www.cbsm.com.

This site includes the following resources:

• Online guide to using community-based social marketing to foster sustainable behavior. This guide provides detailed information on how to design environmental programs to effectively change behavior. This guide is of use to those who design programs to encourage activities such as waste reduction, water and energy efficiency, watershed protection, pollution prevention, alternative transportation choices, etc.
• Searchable database of more than 1,200 academic articles on fostering sustainable behavior, graphics, case studies and downloadable reports
• Discussion forum for sharing information and asking questions

In order to fully comprehend water resource issues as we face them now, we must understand the historical context of water management in Florida. To this end, a history of water management in Florida, focusing particularly on the history of the St. Johns River Water Management District, has been compiled.

This comprehensive Web site will include:

• Biographies and historical documents of District Governing Board members
• Timeline of water management history in our region and state 

The Web pages are available to the public on the SJRWMD Web site at http://www.sjrwmd.com/history/index.html.

A new Web site titled The River Returns: Stories of the Great St. Johns River is available at http://www.theriverreturns.org/. The site is based on a documentary due on public television Tuesday, Oct. 25, 2005. The expedition team’ deep-diving, high-flying filmmakers and scientists documented the St. Johns River from above and below. The Web site describes a series of grade 6-12 lesson plans based on the documentary that became available in September. Links to other educational Web sites such as the Florida Envirothon, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency High School Center, Florida Agriculture in the Classroom Inc., and the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission’s Project WILD are included on this site.

Lesson plans are available to educators on the National Geographic Web site at http://www.nationalgeographic.com/education/lesson_plans/index.html. Plans include topics such as "Introduction to Longitude and Latitude," "What’s so Key about a Keystone Species" and "To build an Island."

National Geographic home page has an online version of its award-winning magazine for kids, National Geographic Kids http://www.nationalgeographic.com/index.html.

“Energy Down the Drain” looks at the amount of energy it takes to treat, deliver, heat, cool, and use water, and the surprising amounts of energy that can be saved through water conservation measures. This report was produced with the Natural Resources Defense Council and is on its site at http://www.nrdc.org/water/conservation/edrain/contents.asp.

WaterWays

Fourth- and fifth-grade students and their teachers can access 14 lessons, each with hands-on experiments and engaging quizzes, from this highly popular curriculum in its new online format. Completely updated to include correlation with FCAT and SSS, lessons can be used individually or as a series, and are designed to supplement science, language and math curricula.

Overall, the WaterWays curriculum focuses on leaving students with three major principles: that all natural systems are interrelated and interdependent, that human actions have an effect on these natural systems, and that everyone can make a difference in protecting our waterways. Go to http://www.sjrwmd.com/education/waterways/educators/index.html to access the program.

Facilitator Training 

On July 21 and 22 at Stephen Foster State Park, 24 educators joined the ranks of Florida’s Project WET facilitators. Participants traveled from all over the state to receive training in WET, Project WILD and Project Learning Tree (PLT).

Facilitator Page

Don’t forget to visit the Facilitator Page on our Web site at http://www.sjrwmd.com/education/projectwet/facilitators.html. There you will find workshop forms, SSS correlations and FCAT sample questions.

Manual Revisions

The Project WET manual is being scheduled for revisions in the near future. Forward any suggestions, changes, additions, or new material that should be included in the manual to Eileen Tramontana at etramontana@sjrwmd.com.

WET National Evaluation

Florida has been chosen as a test state for the implementation of a new national evaluation of Project WET. As a result, you may soon be seeing a different evaluation form being used at workshops. We look forward to meaningful results of this nationwide effort.

For more information on the District’s education material and programs, contact:

Deirdre A. Irwin
Youth Education Coordinator
dirwin@sjrwmd.com
(386) 329-4291

Visit the District’s Web site at http://www.sjrwmd.com/education/.