Air Pollution and the Power of Bicycles

Contributors: Joanna Rockwell, Kittie Buck, Steven Ashlock

At the beginning of this sustainability project, the three of us had very different interests. Kittie was interested in investigation of alternative energy, Joanna was interested in researching bike transportation, and Steven was interested in the idea of building around pre-existing public transportation. We narrowed our focus to bicycles and how to encourage more people to choose bicycle and mass transportation whenever possible. After some serious brainstorming we realized the obvious- we were all interested in combating air pollution through transportation.

Air pollution is a serious problem. Not only is our ozone being destroyed, but air pollution can have serious health effects on people. Not only is the use of fossil fuels harming our environment, they are also running out. Alternative transportation and energies are essential to decreasing air pollution and increasing public health. There is no better time to see what you and your students can do to stop air pollution now!

You will find various resources to help you and your students become informed about air pollution and combat it below. There are book suggestions, website links, and even some links to lesson plans that have already been planned.

Websites and Organizations:

California Air Resources Board: The Know Zone
http://www.arb.ca.gov/knowzone/teachers/links.htm -
This website has links to all kinds of websites regarding air pollution. A lot of the links have interactive activities. There are also links to websites that discuss the detrimental effect air pollution has on health.

A Student’s Guide to Global Climate Change
http://epa.gov/climatechange/kids/index.html
This website provides a video and a bunch of information pages about global climate change that is important. It explains that air pollution of carbon dioxide is a part of what is harming our planet. Carbon dioxide traps heat in our atmosphere, and that is having all sorts of negative side effects, for example, melting the glaciers. It empasises that we need to make a change in our behaviors now, before it is too late, and provides simple ways that students can make changes.

Kids Health
http://kidshealth.org/kid/asthma_basics/triggers/ozone_asthma.html
This is a good article for kids. It explains what ozone is in simple terms. It also gives examples of what can cause air pollution such as exhaust given of by cars, factories, and power plants. Then it goes into how breathing in toxic air can our health.

Kids Health

http://kidshealth.org/kid/watch/out/bike_safety.html

Here is a short article on Bike Safety. It covers everything from choosing the proper helmet to wear, to all the hand signals to use when riding. This article is important for promoting forms of transportation that do not pollute the environment and also give kids some exercise.

Drive Clean: Buying Guide
http://www.driveclean.ca.gov/index.php
Here is a website that helps people choose a car that is better for the environment. You can search the year, make, and model of the car you want and see how clean and efficient it is.  
Quote from the site: "Looking to reduce your carbon footprint, save money or just contribute less to that nasty smog? Well, this is your buying guide to the cleanest, most efficient cars on the market."

ARB Bicycle Awareness Program
http://www.arb.ca.gov/planning/tsaq/bicycle/factsht.htm
This is a Bicycle Fact Sheet with statistics about how more bike travel can dramatically decrease the pollution in California. The site also discusses ways the government is trying to promote more bike travel in California. Here is a quote: "More Bicycling = Less Pollution. The U.S. Department of Transportation's three-year National Bicycling and Walking Study, completed in 1994, identified strategies for doubling the percentage of total trips made by bicycling and walking and identified scenarios for increasing bicycle trips by 3 to 5 times current levels. The 1991 Statewide Travel Survey found 1.3 percent of trips were made by bicycle."

CoolCalifornia.org
http://www.coolcalifornia.org/article/climate-change-curriculum
Here is a great site that actually has links to climate change curriculum for grades K-12. There are several links for specific lesson plans and even some school assemblies that educate kids about global warming and how to promote a healthy environment.

Spare the Air
http://www.sparetheair.org
This website has information for the community as well as teachers and students about the air in the San Francisco Bay Area. The site notifies viewers of upcoming spare the air days. If you navigate to the educational tools section (http://www.sparetheair.org/Get-Involved/For-Teachers-and-Students/Educational-Tools.aspx), you will find videos as well as interactive activities.

Coalition for Clean Air
http://www.coalitionforcleanair.org/
The Coalition for Clean Air is committed to restoring clean, healthy air to all of California and strengthening the environmental movement by promoting broad-based community involvement, advocating responsible public policy and providing technical expertise. Their website has a ton of facts and information for anyone interested in clean air solutions or air pollution in general.

California Bicycle Coalition
http://www.calbike.org/resources.htm
This site has an array of local and national bicycle information. Local information is separated by county so viewers may find the the information for their own location. There is also lots of information on how to get involved in the political side of biking, as well as safety tips, bicycle commuting tips, and information on bicycle related legislation.

Erideshare (online carpooling community)

http://www.erideshare.com/
This is an amazing resource for those looking to cut down on air pollution through carpooling. This site provides a network of people all over the world sharing their commute information in order to find others willing to carpool with them in order to get more cars off the road.

Air Now (air quality measurements by location)
http://www.airnow.gov/
AIr Now is a government site that provides information on the quality of air in any given city in the US. The layout is easy to use with a color scheme of green for “good” air quality, yellow for “moderate”, and red for “bad”. Further technical information is also provided.

Lesson Plans:

http://www.koshland-science-museum.org/teach/show/58/are_you_an_energy_efficient_consumer
Lesson plan geared towards 6th-12th graders. Has students calculating their carbon footprint

http://www.atozteacherstuff.com/pages/468.shtml
This lesson plan is suggested as a lesson plan to begin a week long unit on air pollution. It has some good ideas that could be used as a whole lesson plan, or as supplements to other lesson plans about air pollution. Suggested for early elementary school

http://www.juliantrubin.com/encyclopedia/environment/airpollution.html
This website has links to background information as well as to suggested lesson plans and experiments. There are activities appropriate, or could be adapted to all age ranges.

http://www.lessonplanet.com/lesson-plans/air-pollution
This is a fantastic website that offers nearly 1000 lesson plans/activities related to air pollution. You can narrow down the age range as well as select lesson  plans with high ratings to be suggested.

Suggested Books for Children (sorted by audience age):

Ages 4-8:
- Bridges, A. (2009). Clean Air. Flashpoint. ISBN: 978-1596435766
            This books is art of a series (Sally Ride Science) that teaches children about all parts of

the environment. This specific book talks about all the greenhouse gases that are being added into the atmosphere.

- Glass, S. (2006). Sara Sparrow. Dog Ear Publishing. ISBN: 978-1598580655
            This is a fictional story told from a sparrow’s point of view. Sara the sparrow finds it

difficult to breath once she reaches polluted air and helps kids discover what air pollution is, what causes it, and how it can be reduced. There are links to resources to help students discover more information online.

- Jimenez, N. & Jimenez, E. (2010). Blow: Air. Barron’s Educational Series.

ISBN: 978-0764145452. Part of a series of environmental books. Explains why clean air is necessary, and instills that our resources are precious and need to be taken care of. there are suggested activities in book.

- Lewellyn, C. (2005). Fight air pollution (Save the planet). Anova books. ISBN: 978-1844583010

Presents things that children can do to help the environment,

especially by reducing air pollution, starting at home and school and into the community.

- Royston, A. (2008). Polluted air. Heinemann-Raintree. ISBN:  978-1432909314

Explains air pollution, what causes it, what can help reduce it, and ways that everyone

can make a difference.

Ages 5-9:
- Rockwell, A. (2009). What’s so bad about gasoline?: Fossil fuels and what they do. Harper

Collins Publishers. ISBN: 978-0061575273

Part of the ‘Let’s Read and Find Out’ series of books. Talks about how fossil fuels are running out, and how they are harmful to the environment.

Ages 7-9:
- Knight, M. J. (2011). Why should I walk more often? The Creative Company.

ISBN: 978-1897563502. This book provides a wide variety of information including how

fumes from transportaiton negatively affect the air quality, cause acid rains, and

suggestions about how to reduce air pollution including using alternative transportation

than car travel, using non-fossil fuels, and planting trees to help clean the air.

Ages 9-12:
- Benduhn, T. (2008). Ethanol and other new fuels. Gareth Stevens Publishing.

ISBN: 978-0836893595

Part of a the Energy for Today series. Also available in Spanish.

- Benduhn, T. (2008). Nuclear power. Gareth Stevens Publishing. ISBN: 978-0836893618
            Part of the Energy for Today series. Also available in Spanish.
- Benduhn, T. (2008). Oil, gas, and coal. Garth Stevens Publishing. ISBN: 978-0836893601
            Part of the Energy for Today series. Also available in Spanish.
- Feinstein, S. (2010). Solving the air pollution problem: What you can do. Enslow Publishers.

ISBN: 978-0766033474

- Higgins, M. (2011). The air out there: How clean is clean? Norwood House

Press. ISBN: 978-1599534510

- Gardner, R. (2011). Air: Green science projects for a sustainable planet (Team green science

projects). Enslow Pub Inc. ISBN: 978-076603468

This book could be a great resource to help teachers integrate science and air

pollution/environmental studies.

- Lucas-Donald, R. (2002). Air pollution. CT: Children’s Press. ISBN: 978-0516259987

This book is a part of the True Book series. List of sources in the back for websites, more

books about air pollution.

- Meachen Rau, D. (2010). Alternative energy: Beyond fossil fuels. Compass Point Books.
            ISBN: 978-0756542894. This is a chapter book.
Young Adult or No Given age range:
- Morgan, S. (2007). The pros and cons of coal, gas, and oil (The energy debate). Rosen

Central. ISBN: 978-1404237445. Young adult suggested audience.

- Walker, J. (2003). Atmosphere in danger (Environmental disasters). Orchard/Watts Group.
            ISBN: 978-0749649524. This book does not have a suggested age.
            This book seems to be a little deeper than the others. Talks about how natural disasters

and man-made ‘disasters’ are causing harm to the environment. Discusses how the atmosphere that has been damaged can be repaired.

      
The previous books were found on amazon.com and barnesandnoble.com. The list above is just a sample of some of the most current books concerning air pollution.

Research Articles:

The following articles provide insight into academic research concerning air pollution and bicycling.

The role of light duty vehicles in the future of air pollutions: a case study of Sacramento - by Guihua Wang
Transportation Planning and Technology
Vol. 33, No. 6, August 2010, 54154
The Climate Value of Cycling
Natural Resources Forum; May2011, Vol. 35 Issue 2, p100-111, 13p

Ten thousand bicycles in Portland
Earth Island Journal; Summer2006, Vol. 21 Issue 2, p42-42, 1p

Creating Political Pressure for Cycling
Transportation Research Part A: Policy & Practice; Aug2009, Vol. 43 Issue 7, p665-684, 20p

Cost–benefit analyses of walking and cycling track networks taking into account insecurity, health effects and external costs of motorized traffic.
Transportation Research Part A: Policy & Practice; Oct2004, Vol. 38 Issue 8, p593-606, 14p

Fossil fuels, transport, and public health.
BMJ: British Medical Journal (International Edition); 11/11/2000, Vol. 321 Issue 7270, p1168-1169, 2p

Make Way for Bicycles, a Cleaner Way to Go
New York Times; 1/ 1/1991, p28, 0p

Resources for Waste Education and Reduction

Resources for Waste Education and Reduction

Kara Matteis and Erin Maravilla

The increasing world population alongside production and consumption of disposable material items has created a capacity issue for waste storage.  Unfortunately, our bustling lifestyle coupled with the desire for food and products to be immediate and disposal has created excess waste.   Many landfills in our country have closed due to overfill and finding new places to store our waste becomes an issue.  Communities do not want waste in their ‘backyard’, nor do they want to think about it when they are throwing away their plastic bottles everyday.

As Masters in Education students at UCSC, we feel it is our responsibility to uncover this issue of sustainability and to provide resources for future educators.  When facing a calamity such as this, educators need to be hopeful in the future of our students.  We need to provide our students with the tools to critically analyze environmental issues and create possible solutions.  Along with our students, we will all be facing the crisis of excess consumable goods leading to waste.

The role that plastic plays within this framework is disheartening, but important to acknowledge in order to institute change.  Acknowledging the lack of necessity for plastic bottle products and focusing on reusable bottles, containers or materials is the first step to changing our country’s relation to waste.  

Videos: 

Atlas Films (2009) Tapped
This documentary examines the effects the bottled water industry has upon human health, climate change, pollution and natural resources.  The movie also delves into how plastic water bottles are related to our oil dependence and delves into the social injustices of extracting natural resources.             
       
State of Thirst: California’s Water Future

This video is a great resource for educators to  inform themselves or to share with their classrooms.  This film documents California’s water situation and the scarcity of water.  This would be a great tool for teaching why the plastic water bottle industry is wasteful in terms of marketing a natural resource.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=panaJZaffYk&feature=relmfu


21st Century Rainfall

This video provides a visualization for how many water bottles are thrown out with common trash as opposed to recycled.  The imagery is shocking and will be a useful tool for students to realize their collective decision making when they dispose of recyclable items.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OZbTXDkrD1o



Story of Stuff: Plastic Water Bottle
This short film was produced by the Story of Stuff Project, which focuses on our consumption habits and the ill fate of our environment due to this consumption.  The project’s ‘Bottled Water’ short film gives a brief explanation of the issues surrounding the plastic water bottle industry.  There are social and environmental injustices at play and we have only begun to see the effects of our ‘bottled water habit’.  This film challenges people to make the right decision when it comes to choosing to purchase or consumer water in plastic bottles.  It could be a great video to expose middle school or high school students to the reality of the plastic water bottle industry.
http://storyofstuff.org/bottledwater/


This fun ‘Future History’ clip focuses on Plastic Water Bottles and would be a fun video to show the class the ridiculousness of plastic water bottle usage.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gFCbQ7vZxKI

Online Resources:

Back2Tap is a program that focuses primarily on eliminating plastic water bottles.  Back2Tap stresses the importance of education and relates their resource information towards schools.
This site is a great source for educators researching activities or ways to eliminate bottles in the school setting.
http://www.back2tap.com/school-groups/our-program/


CalRecycle’s website provides information and materials for schools wanting to initiate a recycling program.  The website details school profiles, models and strategies to start a recycling program and the importance to do so.    
http://www.calrecycle.ca.gov/ReduceWaste/Schools/default.htm



New York’s Office of Recycling Outreach and Education
This website provides extensive school resources for teachers in need of recycling curriculum ideas or materials.  Produced by GrowNYC, the school resources on the website include video and book information and school community projects that can be modeled.
http://www.grownyc.org/oroe
http://www.grownyc.org/recyclingchampions/resources



This Benefits of Recycling web page is a great resource for students and help understand recycling statistics, facts, and recyclable items.  The site also provides supportive material for teachers conducting curriculum about the importance of recycling.  
http://www.benefits-of-recycling.com/recyclingforkids.html


 
Online Education’s Facts About the Water Bottle:

This site provides a great visual for people of all ages to learn about the life of a water bottle and the effects it has on the environment. It highlights America’s usage of water bottles and the implications of this expensive, “lower quality” source of drinking water.
http://www.onlineeducation.net/bottled_water


Resource for “green” products and reviews:
This web page is an example from the site, “Life Goggles,” which creates reviews of items that are considered to be “green”. It also provides readers with links to articles and interviews pertaining to a green lifestyle.  This web page helps informs educators about decisions they are making.
http://lifegoggles.com/1389/nalgene-plastic-water-bottles-eco-product-review/



“Down the Drain” project”
This site presents a project in which students can explore how much water they use in their homes. There are links to various resources, such as student activities and teacher guides. This is a great source for both educators and students.
http://www.ciese.org/curriculum/drainproj/


Activities, info, & sources for ground water, drinking water, etc:
This is another source for both students and educators, filled with links and resources that share drinking water and ground water information. There is information on conferences and workshops that will inform individuals about how to be more resourceful when using water from different sources, and how to better educate students on this issue. There are lessons included that are aimed toward students of all ages, or specified ages.
http://water.epa.gov/learn/kids/drinkingwater/index.cfm
http://www.epa.gov/region1/students/teacher/groundw.html
http://water.epa.gov/drink/guide/index.cfm

Local Resources:

Green schools program for Santa Cruz County

“The County of Santa Cruz Green Schools Program (GSP) furthers the education of students, teachers and staff on environmental topics including resource conservation, storm water runoff, water quality and conservation, energy conservation, recycling, and waste reduction. The goal of GPS is to support the county’s schools as they evolve into "Green Schools" that model wise resource use, eliminate waste, reduce non-point source pollution, and train students to conserve scarce resources like energy and water. The program provides both in-class and school-wide presentations, educational assemblies, and technical assistance to member schools.” (dpw.co.santa.ca.us)

http://www.dpw.co.santa-cruz.ca.us/www.santacruzcountyrecycles/Green_Schools/index.html
http://www.dpw.co.santa-cruz.ca.us/www.santacruzcountyrecycles/index.html



Santa Cruz County’s School Recycling and Waste Reduction Program

This program provides assistance when setting up a school recycling program.  The provide recycling and trash bins along with informative and colorful stickers and signs.  This program also gives tours of the City of Santa Cruz Resource Recovery Facility and Landfill, conducts interactive classroom presentations and also school wide assemblies.  The program also provides compost bins, worm bins and accessories to local Life Lab programs.  The SCCS Recyling and Waste Reduction Program connects students with the realities of their waste and provides curriculum material for teachers to engage and educate their students.
http://www.dpw.co.santa-cruz.ca.us/www.santacruzcountyrecycles/index.html

Sustainable Gardening: Growing Your Own Food and Native Plants

Sustainable Gardening

Growing Your Own Food and Native Plants

Contributers: Sarah Sloane, Zealand Reynolds, and Etta Murray are Graduate students at UCSC working towards a Masters degree in Education and a multiple subject teaching credential. Collectively, we have created this blog post to assist teachers with implementing sustainability in the classroom. We feel that its important to educate students about the need to support our local communities as well as learning skills around food production and the ecological benefits of keeping native plants present in ecosystems.

Abstract: Teaching about sustainability and habits that promote sustainability is important for children of all ages. The sites we researched are specially geared towards garden education and the benefits of having a garden at school, native plant education and the benefits of planting natives to your area, and finally the local/organic movement and how important it is for our environment and our neighborhoods to support farmers who produce locally.

General resources from the web and brief descriptions:

For garden education: School gardens ensure hands on learning, environmental stewardship, and provides students with the experience of growing and eating food they produce.

• The North American Association for Environmental Education

http://eelink.net/pages/Classroom+Resources-Directories

The North American Association for Environmental Education has an entire archive of compiled environmental education and sustainability education resources. Some are very general but some are more directed towards school yard ecology, soils, etc. and has a bunch of interactive videos, and lesson plan suggestions and samples.

• Botanic Gardens Conservation International

http://www.bgci.org/canada/edu_act/

This Canadian site offers a bunch of lessons meant to take place in the garden. They range from learning about numbers to learning about diversity in the garden setting. It could be a resource for all of the varying types of things other than gardening that can take place within a school or home garden.

• Ecoliteracy

http://www.ecoliteracy.org/resources/books-and-journals

Ecoliteracy has links to various sites including links to an ecological footprint calculator, various films (perhaps more adult appropriate), readings, etc. 

• Ecoliteracy

http://www.ecoliteracy.org/downloads/building-resilience-home 

Offers a lesson plan on resiliency for grades 9-12. 

• Ecoliteracy

http://www.ecoliteracy.org/change/school-gardens

This site has a bunch of benefits of school gardens and tips for getting started and would be great as a teachers resource why attempting to justify planning a school garden at your school.

• Arboretum (University of Wisconsin-Madison)

http://uwarboretum.org/eps/research_act_classroom/rain_garden_curriculum.php

This site offers directions on how to start your own rain garden. It offers a variety of lessons ranging from math problems to art to simple observations. Its a great idea for any class and any age.

• Life Lab

http://www.lifelab.org/for-educators/schoolgardens/#lessons

This site provides Life Lab lessons in garden and sustainability education as well as links to other good teacher resources including garden-based literature lists, sites with even more garden-based lessons, and much more!

• Ag Classroom

http://www.agclassroom.org/directory/search_advanced.cfm

This site is one of the most useful sites I found and can be used when looking for sample lessons ranging from health and safety to nutrition to environmental mathematics. You simply enter in what type of lesson you are looking for and grade and what content you would like to teach and the website finds resources for lessons for you. To give you an idea I took a virtual farm tour and learned the parts of a fish.

From native plant education: Learning about what is native to a given environment creates awareness of ecosystems and how they are unique to specific environments/ communities in which these children are coming from. Through education about natives to an area, students are able to engage in the history of a given land as well as specified uses for each plant.

Why Garden with Native Plants?

-Save water

-Lower Maintenance

-Reduce Pesticides

-Invite Wildlife

-Support Local Ecology

• California Native Plant Society

http://www.cnps.org/

This website offers many resources in relation to native plants of California. There are some resources that offer lesson plans for teachers and educators. One such link is to lessons for 4-8 grades about California oak trees. Also there is a section that offers information about developing a garden that has native plans and the benefits.

• Wild Ones Native Plants, Natural Landscapes

http://www.for-wild.org/

Offers information about Advocating Native Plants in Natural Landscapes, Preservation and Restoration of Native Communities and Promoting Environmental Education. In the education area there are many links to information and access to kids activities, such as kidsgardening.org.

• UCSC Arboretum

http://arboretum.ucsc.edu

Information about the arboretum in Santa Cruz, it houses many plants that are from California, Australia, South Africa, New Zealand and Chile. When learning about California native plants this would be a good resource especially when in Santa Cruz and possibly for a field trip.

• UCSC Arboretum

http://arboretum.ucsc.edu/pdfs/ethnobotany_webversion.pdf

This pdf, created in 2009, is a very useful selection of native California plants and their traditional uses it also provides photos of each plant.

• Native Again Landscape

http://www.native-again-landscape.com/

This site offers examples and instructions for converting your lawn to a native plant garden.

• California Gardens

http://www.californiagardens.com/index.html

This site holds much information about plants, which ones are drought tolerant and about creating your own native plant garden.

• Companion Planting

http://www.seedsofchange.com/enewsletter/issue_55/companion_planting.aspx

This site good resource about gardening and this particular article gives information about companion gardening, increasing the biodiversity of your garden and about growing plants who are beneficial next to each other. There is a large list of many that grow well together and their effects. 

From the local/organic movement: With the growing prevalence of globalization and focus on national issues, it is very important to educate student on how they can support their own community through local food purchases. Organic is becoming a widely popular word and students need to understand what it means, the benefits of organic farming, and the difference they can make by purchasing organic foods.

• Lesson Planet

http://www.lessonplanet.com/search?keywords=buying+local+food&media=lesson

Lesson Planet is a search engine for teachers to access lesson plans on a plethora of topics. Lesson Planet has over 1,000 lesson plans specifically on buying local and also allows you to find worksheets specific to that. The lessons are also reviewed by other teachers and given a grade. 

• Lesson Plans for Growing and Living Organic

https://sites.google.com/site/growinguporganicschoolgardens/home/workshop-ideas

This website provides a collection of 14 lesson plans for a variety of a grade levels. While not a very visually appealing, it does explore a range of fascinating topics about organics. The lesson plans are specific to Ontario, but could easily adapted to any classroom. 

• Local Harvest

http://www.localharvest.org/

The Local Harvest website offers a maps of farms, farmers markets, and small farms that offer interactive activities as well as links to all of the farms websites. There are ideas for parents on how to teach children about eating organic and locally and lots of information on CSA, or Community Supported Agriculture, ventures. This website provides an easy to use guide for farms across America.

• The Greens

http://meetthegreens.pbskids.org/episode14/why-buy-local.html

Meet the Greens is a PBS original series for kids. The show aims to educate children on the benefits of environmental stewardship and green practices. This link directs viewers to a particular episode about the benefits of buying local. From this site you can access information on why buying local is important and the main page for Meet the Greens. 

• Nourish Life

http://www.nourishlife.org/teach/

Nourish Life aims to educate students about where food comes from and it’s impact on community through conversation, videos, and news articles. There are resources for teachers and parents including curriculum guides, worksheets, and videos. Nourish also provides examples of ways in which students, teachers, and parents can act on the information that they learn on the Website. They really emphasize community involvement.