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Notes for Teachers

This is part one of a two part lesson. This lesson sets students up to solve an authentic environmental problem- trash.

There are many specific teachers notes embedded in each section of the lesson which includes hyperlinks, tips, answer keys and examples.

List of Materials

Slates and dry erase markers
Data collection worksheet- hyperlink on slide
Yard stick
Optional- gloves
Optional- colored pencils, markers and construction paper

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Standards

Life Science:

6.L2U3.11

Use evidence to construct an argument regarding the impact of human activities on the environment and how they positively and negatively affect the competition for energy and resources in ecosystems.

Science and Engineering Practices:

● ask questions and define problems

● analyze and interpret data

● use mathematics and computational thinking

● engage in argument from evidence

● obtain, evaluate, and communicate information

Mathematical Practices:

MP.4 Model with mathematics.

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Objectives:

Students will be able to understand the impact human waste has on the environment after watching a video, reading an article, and analyzing national data.

Students will collect and analyze data related to trash production in their school.

Students will be able to identify a problem or need that can be solved by writing a problem statement that is narrowed in scope.

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Agenda: 9 days- 1 month *1 day = a 60 min class period

Day 1:

Introduce phenomenon

Dig deeper

Analyze national trash data

Day 2- about 30 minutes:

Data collection methodology

Days 3-7:

Collect authentic data at your school- in reality this took a couple weeks because we spread out the collection of data

Days 8 and 9:

Define the problem specific to your school

Create a visual representation of the data

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Lesson Design Considerations

For this lesson I used the 7 Steps of Invention to organize the sequence. This resource can be found in the Invention Convention Curriculum provided by the Henry Ford Museum. If you are interested in checking out their resources click the link below. You will have to sign up for an account to access their materials but it is free. Check it out!

The Henry Ford's inHub

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Lesson Design Considerations for Part 1

The part of the engineering process you will find evident in this lesson is the first two steps of inventing: Identifying and understanding. Students often want to go straight to inventing and may not even recognize this as an important part of the engineering process. This part, infact, may take the longest.

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Day 1 Hands-on Activity Instructions

Play video and have students record their thoughts, reactions and connections on a slate or in notebook. Then share out at their table or with the class.
Have students dig deeper. You may present the two slides with additional information or you can create a hand-out. In addition, if your students did not have previous lessons on this topic, I suggest you have them read an additional article- see remediation slide. If you add an additional article you may need to stretch this part of the lesson into two days.
Lastly, students analyze national trash data by answering the three questions posed on the slide. I suggest they do this as a group, and write answers on a slate to share out with the class.

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Identify/Understand - The Great Pacific Garbage Patch

Thoughts? Reactions? Connections?

Day 1

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Background

Trash ends up in the ocean in a variety of pathways. It may go down a sewer system and drain out into the ocean. It may blow in the wind across hundreds of miles. Boats lose cargo containers during a storm. Essentially, the mess is created by the mishandling of trash, but also the sheer amount of trash we produce.

It’s difficult to clean it up because of the volume and size of the trash particles. Most plastics, for example, break down into microplastics, which is just like it sounds, super small pieces of plastic. It’s like trying to scoop out pepper in a giant bowl of soup that is also swirling as you try to scoop.

The trash impacts the health of the aquatic ecosystems. Larger pieces of trash, like plastic bags, can be mistaken as food for sea turtles and seabirds. The plastic makes them feel full and it gets stuck in their digestive tract. This causes them to become sick and eventually starve to death.

Many organizations are working on cleaning up the mess we have made, but it’s a large and daunting task. One thing is for sure, the best way we can help is to not add to the mess and reduce, reuse and recycle.

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Connection to Natural Resources

A lot of the stuff in our trash comes from natural resources. Paper, for example, comes from trees. Many plastics are made using fossil fuels. Food comes from animals and plants, both use a huge amount of water to grow, raise, and process. Many of these resources are replenishable, but if we use them up faster than they can be replenished, we can run out. Not to mention the environmental impact the waste has on our health and the health of environments we depend on. The more we can reduce, reuse, or recycle, the less demand there is for natural resources.

How can we run out of trees if they are a renewable natural resource?

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What does this data represent?
What trends or patterns do you notice?
What might explain the patterns you notice?

Per Person

Total Trash

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Answer key

What do these data represent? The amount of trash each person generates and how much total trash is generated
What trends or patterns do you notice? The amount of total trash has been increasing each year. The amount of trash per person also has a positive trend but it has decreased since its peak in 2000. Despite the amount of trash being stable since 1990 the total amount of trash has increased much quickly.
What might explain the patterns you notice? Most trash does not biodegrade and piles up in the landfill, so even though people aren't throwing more trash away per person, it just keeps adding to the trash that’s already there.

Per Person

Total Trash

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Identify/ Understand - Solutions for our School’s Pollution *Teacher’s Slide

Google doc → Solution for Pollution

Teacher poses: Solving our country’s and the ocean’s trash problem is a tall order- but can we start smaller and help our school? What kinds of trash do you think we are throwing away at school?

Day 2

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Hands-on Activity Instructions: Identify/Understand- Finding a Solution for our Schools’ Pollution

Data collection methodology:

Define the room(s) in which you will collect data- I suggest collecting data from a limited number of classrooms.
You also have to consider which trashcan you will use if you have more than one trashcan in your room, or if you want to combine the trash at the end of the day.
Try to collect data towards the end of the day five or more times. You can add additional rows for data if needed.
I had the students use a meter stick to rummage around in the trash rather than dump it out or use gloves.
Collect data by calling small groups of students to check out the trash can and allow them to confirm their finding with a group or the class so that data is being collected consistently.
If you want to collect more precise data you will have to design a different chart to reflect that.

Day 2

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Assessment

After the period of data collection, students will need to draw conclusions as to what kind of trash is being thrown away the most. If your school is like mine, than you should expect paper to be thrown away the most.

Optional* Have students create a visual of the data. The data sheet that I created does not lend itself nicely to a line or bar graph- but you could do a histogram. Instead I had my students come up with their own way of displaying their data. The inspiration for this is from a book called Dear Data - see the remediation/extension slide for information about the book.
Have students define the problem using the following sentence frame based on the data specific to their school: (Who) needs (what) because (why).

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Assessment Examples:

Problem Statement: Our class needs a way to reuse or recycle paper because it is getting thrown away and adding to the trash in the landfill.

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Assessment Continued- this rubric is for part 1 and 2 to use at the end of the project

Part of Project	5 Excellent	4 Good	3 Fair	2 Poor	1 Not Present
Identify/ Understanding Student researched information and/or collected data that helped them better understand the cause of the problem or how to solve it. Student narrowed down the problem in scope.
Ideation/Design Student thought of a logical solution to the problem based on criteria and constraints. Student drew their design, which included labels.
Building/Testing Student built a prototype based on their design that shows some degree of engineering skill. Students collected data and/or observations on the prototype and/or the process in which you create the prototype.
Evaluating/Communicating Students thought of pro’s and con’s of their prototype, and also ways they could improve upon their design. Students shared their feedback on the worksheet and shared their thoughts with their table groups.

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Differentiation

Additional research material on the Great Pacific Garbage Patch.

Great Pacific Garbage Patch

Provide key vocabulary with images.

Remediation

Extension/Enrichment

Students create a visual of their data based on inspiration from the book Dear Data By: Stefanie Posavec and Giorgia Lupi.

The book is expensive but there are a lot of examples of their post cards if you just look through google images.