Language Arts

This brief reading passage discusses types, sources, and impacts of marine debris, including an anecdote about recovery from Hurricane Katrina in Mississippi.

After gaining a better understanding of types and volumes of waste discarded in the U.S. and how much of that is recovered, students get into groups and create a Public Service Announcement (PSA) designed to educate the public about single-use plastics and mitigating marine debris. The PSA can be a skit, video or poster.

In this lesson, students assess where particles are suspended in the water column (using a premade plastic slurry). Next, the slurry is mixed into a tub of water that is designed to mimic seawater and students take samples to assess the amount, size, and type of the particulates. Students relate this activity to what they might actually find in the ocean.

In this lesson, students analyze the Ocean Conservancy’s International Coastal Cleanup data to make inferences about which countries documented the most amount of marine debris and the types of debris found/collected. Students also answer prompts about why some states or countries had much higher amounts of marine debris reported than others.

In this lesson, students build a model showing how water flows through a system and evaluate different management practices to see how they might reduce the amount of marine debris that enters the marine environment. The models in this lesson could be used as a classroom demonstration or traditional lab investigation for students, depending on time efficiency of instructor and students.

In this lesson, students are introduced to marine debris and participate in a role-playing exercise acting as beachgoers, boaters, homeowners, factory managers, or managers of a waste disposal company. Students discuss their role and how they can manage or prevent marine debris. Students then make a commitment to decreasing their plastic consumption.

Students will extend their experience in the cleanup by discussing and analyzing ways to prevent marine debris from entering the environment, including Reduce/Reuse/Recycle strategies, Personal habits; Policy change, etc. Using a 4-corners style activity, students will separate debris materials (from the debris deck) into categories for Reduce/Reuse/Recycle/Other.

This lesson includes discussions and activities meant to help students process and analyze their cleanup experience. Students will reflect on the strangest trash item collected and tell the story of its journey to the cleanup site using a medium of their choice (writing, drawing, skits, etc.).

Students will begin to understand the impact marine debris has on their own comunities and lives. 

An introductory lesson using discussion, vocabulary, and critical thinking activities to understand land- and ocean-based sources of marine debris.

Using cards to represent each type of debris identified on the Ocean Concervancy's list of items found during cleanups, students will discuss each debris type and arrange themselves in order of most commonly found. (Debris Deck cards included.)

Trash Tale is a fill-in the blank, "Mad Libs"-style activity telling the story of a piece of trash that ends up in the environment and what happens to it along the way.

Students use a graphic organizer to review existing solutions to microplastic marine debris, and brainstorm feasible, actionable solutions to microplastics. They discuss challenges to implementing solutions.

Students learn about community organizations and what actions they are taking to reduce marine debris. Students then can organize a cleanup of the school campus, a local waterway or beach, or join another community cleanup project. This activity is available for Grades 4-5, 6-8, and 9-12, within the "Solutions" unit. 

Students use scientific models as a tool to evaluate the many kinds of risk tsunami marine debris poses. They then explore the risk posed by live organisms that have colonized tsunami marine debris.