Flathead Watershed Sourcebook Educators’ Guide v1.0: October 2016 Michael Brody & Rose Vallor Department of Education College of Education, Health and Human Development Montana State University Bozeman, Montana Developed for and funded by: Flathead Community of Resource Educators (CORE), Watershed Education Committee Photo Credit on cover page: North Fork of the Flathead River, Michael Gallacher, Missoulian http://missoulian.com/news/local/daines-introduces-north-fork-protection-act-in-u-s- house/article_2df11b98-ce1b-11e2-b843-001a4bcf887a.html Table of Contents About the Educators’ Guide 1 Chapter 1: What is a Watershed? 3 Introduction Lessons 5 Intro-1 People in the Flathead Watershed 7 Intro-2 Interviewing People in the Flathead Watershed 11 Chapter One Lessons 15 Ch. 1-1 Boundaries of the Flathead Watershed 17 Ch. 1-2 ‘My Place in the Flathead Watershed’ Journal 23 Ch. 1-3 Modeling Watersheds in Paper 27 Ch. 1-4 Site Mapping in the Watershed 31 Ch. 1-5 Stream and River Flow 35 Ch. 1-6 Flooding in the Upper Flathead Watershed 45 Ch. 1-7 Quotes from Watershed Perspectives 53 Ch. 1-8 Watershed Poetry of Place 57 Ch. 1-9 Field Notes 61 Ch. 1-10 Field Trip Safety 65 Chapter 2: Natural History 67 Chapter Two Lessons 69 Ch. 2-1. Classroom Mural of Geologic Time in the Flathead Watershed 71 Ch. 2-2 Soil Pit Profile Survey 75 Ch. 2-3 Cupcake Soil Profiles 79 Ch. 2-4 Flathead Climate and Weather 81 Ch. 2-5 The Changing Glaciers of the Flathead Watershed 85 Ch. 2-6 Investigation of Snow Layer Profiles 89 Ch. 2-7 Water Breathing Classroom Investigations 93 Ch. 2. 8 Field Investigations for Water Breathing 101 Ch. 2-9 Travel Brochures to Flathead Watershed’s Ecosystems 107 Ch. 2. 10 Flathead Lake Living Web Through Time 111 Ch. 2 11 Fisheries, Fishing and Fish 119 Ch. 2-12 Passing the Trophic Level Energy Torch 123 Ch. 2-13 Animal Stories of the Flathead 127 Ch. 2-14 Quotes from Natural History Perspectives 131 Chapter 3: Cultural History 135 Chapter Three Lessons 137 Ch. 3-1 Native Place Names in the Flathead Watershed 139 Ch. 3-2 Flathead Watershed History in Tree Rings 143 Ch. 3-3 Stories of Stewardship in the Flathead Watershed 147 Ch. 3-4 Quotes from Cultural History Perspectives 151 Chapter 4: Water 155 Chapter Four Lessons 157 Ch. 4-1 Mapping Water Pathways in Our Schools 159 Ch. 4-2 Plankton in the Flathead Watershed 163 Ch. 4-3 Measuring Streams in the Flathead Watershed 167 Ch. 4-4 The Stream Restoration Game Plan 171 Ch. 4-5 Stream Use Town Council 179 Ch. 4-6 The Outdoor Preparedness Challenge 185 Ch. 4-7 Quotes about Life and Water 189 Chapter 5: Influences 193 Chapter Five Lessons 195 Ch. 5-1 Paint Tray Stream Investigations 197 Ch. 5-2 Adding up Impacts in Flathead Waterways 201 Ch. 5-3 School Stormwater Stencil Projects 205 Ch. 5-4 Visiting Water Treatment Plants 209 Ch. 5-5 Advertising BPM’s for a Cause: 213 Best Management Practices for the Flathead Watershed 213 Ch. 5-6 Investigating Flathead Flora 217 Ch. 5-7 Flathead Watershed Aquatic Invasive Species 221 Ch. 5-8 What is the Meaning of Conservation? 223 Chapter 6: Our Land and Bounty 227 Chapter Six Lessons 229 Ch. 6-1 Managing Multiple Use in the Flathead Watershed 231 Ch. 6-2 Resolving Wildlife and Natural Resource Conflicts 235 Ch. 6-3 Wilderness Perspectives 239 Ch. 6-4 Who’s Your Flathead Farmer? 245 Ch. 6-5 School Gardens 247 Ch. 6-6 Products from the Flathead Watershed 251 Chapters 7 & 8: Economics & Partners 255 Chapter Seven Lessons 257 Ch. 7-1 Flathead Careers and Jobs 259 Ch. 7-2 A Day in the Life: Natural Resource Work in the Flathead Watershed 261 Ch. 7-3 Ecosystem Values of the Flathead Watershed 265 Chapter Eight Lessons 273 Ch. 8-1 Working Together in Dragon Boats 275 Ch. 8-2 Stewardship in Action 279 Appendix A: NGSS and Common Core Correlation Table 283 Appendix B: Suggested Themes within Lessons 289 The Flathead Watershed Sourcebook Educators’ Guide About the Educators’ Guide The Flathead Watershed Sourcebook Educators’ Guide was developed to provide educators with place-based interdisciplinary lessons focusing on the Flathead Watershed. The objective is to teach about the natural and social components of the watershed and to help learners develop positive values of stewardship towards the Flathead Watershed. This development of the Flathead Watershed Sourcebook Educators’ Guide (the “Guide”) was a collaboration of the Flathead Community of Resource Educators and the Department of Education at Montana State University – Bozeman. The development of the Guide was coordinated by Lori Curtis ([email protected]) Whitefish Lake Institute, Whitefish, Montana , and Valerie Kurth ([email protected]) Flathead Conservation District, Kalispell, MT. The authors of the Guide are Michael Brody ([email protected]) Department of Education, Montana State University, Bozeman, MT and Rose Vallor ([email protected]), Department of Education, Montana State University, Bozeman, MT. The Guide is complementary to the Flathead Watershed Sourcebook (2010), written by Lori Curtis and available online at http://www.flatheadwatershed.org/. Together, the Sourcebook and the Guide provide detailed natural and social science content with hands-on experiential learning activities. The Guide provides supplementary curriculum materials that correlate with national and Montana state standards. Both formal and informal educators can use these lessons with learners throughout the watershed. Rather than developing the Guide in isolation, the authors conducted a research study with educators, resource managers, and scientists to ascertain the essential understandings that project partners concluded should be included in the Guide. The report on the Flathead Watershed Delphi Study can be found at http://www.informalscience.org/flathead- watershed-educators-guide-phase-1-delphi-survey-project-report. Educators’ Guide Components The Guide was written to reflect a sense of place, that is, lessons are based on places and events in the Flathead Watershed. Lessons are intended to help learners connect with the environment around them. Most lessons are interdisciplinary, integrating various combinations of natural and social sciences, humanities, arts and language. The lessons were developed for middle level curriculum, but can be adapted for earlier and later grade levels. In each chapter we have included lessons which require students to read and write about the watershed, with an emphasis on deep reading for meaning. In Appendix A we have 1 correlated the lessons with the Next Generation Science Standards and the Common Core. In Appendix B we have organized lessons across various topics and themes that might be taught as curriculum units. These thematic units include themes such as water quality and community action. About the Educators’ Guide Lessons The Guide lessons have standardized formats. Each lesson includes an interesting title, an essential question, lesson summary, objectives addressing cognitive, skill and affective outcomes, materials list, background content for the educator, a detailed procedure for teaching the lesson and suggested assessments of learning outcomes. Included for each lesson are available resources for learning more about the content of the lesson and for teaching the lessons. About the Educators’ Guide Authors Michael Brody is a professor of science education in the Department of Education in the College of Education, Health and Human Development at Montana State University, Bozeman, Montana. He teaches undergraduate science teaching methods and graduate courses in education research. He has worked on local, state, national and international curriculum projects including the Habitable Planet: a Systems Approach to Teaching Environmental Science which received the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) Science Prize for Online Resource in Education (SPORE) https://www.learner.org/courses/envsci/. Rose Vallor is a doctoral student in the curriculum and instruction program in the Department of Education at Montana State University, Bozeman, MT. Rose has been a Montana certified informal science teacher for over 15 years, teaching natural and physical science in classrooms, museums and nature camps throughout Southwest Montana. She has facilitated state-wide workshops for teachers for environmental education guides based on water and forestry science, and has taught science teaching methods courses at Montana State University. She has written a number of science curriculums and both utilized and taught Montana, NGSS and Common Core standards curriculum correlation. Her Master’s thesis research topic was the Delphi survey that gathered the essential understandings the Educator’s Guide is founded on. Acknowledgements The authors would like to thank the educator and teacher volunteers who field tested the lessons and provided feedback on improving our work. Thank you for your review work and providing inspiration for us to continue our work on this innovative curriculum project. 2 Chapter 1: What is a Watershed? Background American geologist, ethnologist, explorer, and government administrator John Wesley Powell described a watershed as “…that area of land, a bounded hydrologic system, within which all living things are inextricably linked by their common water course and where, as humans settled, simple logic demanded that they become part of a community.” Introduction This beginning chapter in the Guide is designed to introduce teachers and learners to the concept of a watershed. The lessons will also lay a foundation for future activities that can be conducted as part of any Sourcebook chapters or Guide chapters. For example, the lesson 1-2 Watershed Journals or lesson 1-9 Flathead Field Notes can be used in the natural history section to document plants and animals on watershed field trips. In general, the lessons help students understand what is the Flathead Watershed, develop skills to be used throughout the Flathead Watershed studies and develop an appreciation for the watershed through arts and literature.