YOUTH EDUCATION
The earlier we begin talking to children about the importance of water quality, the better! Resources from IRWP’s Youth Education Programs can help you introduce water quality topics in the classroom or at home.
Education at IRWP
Our location in Cave Springs is home to a beautiful nature preserve. We utilize this space for unique educational field trips. We offer a variety of water related experiences for students of all ages. It is our hope that through our efforts in youth education we will promote a closer relationship between students and their natural environment and, subsequently, improve the health of our watershed.
We also offer the opportunity for teachers to bring IRWP into your classroom. With a certified educator on staff with 7 years of science education experience, we would love a chance to come your classroom with our mobile learning labs. Additionally, we would be more than happy to collaborate with teachers on any lesson they think would promote a healthy watershed environment! Keep scrolling for more information.
Field Trips to IRWP’s Sanctuary
Are you interested in visiting IRWP in Cave Springs? We offer a unique learning experience for students of all ages. If you are bringing water and environmental quality into your classrooms, we’d love to bring you to ours! Click below to submit a request form and we’ll get things started. Check our calendar at the bottom of this page to check for potentially available dates.
Mobile Learning Labs
Can’t make it to Cave Springs? Let us come to you! IRWP offers a variety of mobile lessons that we can bring into your classroom. We also have a certified educator on staff that would love to create custom lessons for and with you. Have a standard that you need some assistance with? Let IRWP help you meet the needs of you and your students. Choose and option below and we’ll be in touch! Check our calendar at the bottom of this page to check for potentially available dates.
Looking for Volunteer Opportunities?
IRWP is a great place to contribute your time to making an impact at the community level. We are seeking motivated individuals to assist in our Youth Education and Water Quality initiative. You would be playing a direct role improving your watershed through participation in public youth education. Your responsibilities would include the education of K-12 students of the significance of water quality and ecosystem health.
FOR EDUCATORS: IRWP Developed Lessons
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Color Scavenger Hunt
This nature scavenger hunt gets young explorers to observe the world around them. Using the workbook, students will search the area around them to find items that match the colors given.
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Nature Journaling
This nature journaling template is a great outdoors activity for students in middle school to high school (elementary and early childhood version coming soon). Everything from creative writing class to science class can learn how to start a nature journal, and most importantly, learn how to be an observer of the world around you.
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Bio Indexing - Macroinvertebrates
Students will collect live macroinvertebrates from a river or stream. They will then classify and count the invertebrates and use that data to determine the health of the ecosystem
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Success of the Commons
The success of the commons refers to a situation in which individuals with access to a shared resource act in their own interest. This ultimately leads to environmental degradation. Students will learn the value of rules and regulation of resources.
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Watershed Exploration
Students will gain an understanding of what a watershed is - the land and resources that define it - as well as create their own watershed. Middle/Junior and High school student will utilize software to analyze land use within their own watershed - the Illinois River Watershed!
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We All Live Downstream
In this lesson, students will be given a hypothetical amount of money and a section of riverfront property that they can do what they choose to with. They will draw and describe what they chose to do with the land and then arrange their drawings together to form a river. Students will then describe the impact of their landuse on their neighbors downstream as they pass items that represent pollution downstream.
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Water Chemistry
This scenario-based lesson will ask students to analyze the water quality of a stream section in order to determine if the stream is impaired for certain parameters. In-field water chemistry kits will be brought into the classroom and students will learn the techniques used to determine water quality. Parameters include Dissolved Oxygen, Phosphorus, Nitrate, pH, and Alkalinity.
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Watershed Pollution
This gallery walk style lesson will teach students about various types of pollution to our watersheds. A student led demonstration will show how pollutants flow through a landscape to one point. Then students will analyze a “water sample” to determine the greatest source of pollution in order to develop a solution to that type of pollution.
Get in touch.
Not finding what you are looking for? Send us a message telling us how we can help you find it. We’re always looking for new ways to meet the needs of our visitors and supporters.
Have any suggestions for us? We’d love to hear them! Improving our practice is an essential part of our organization. The best way for us to learn is through your input. How can IRWP be better?
Upcoming Field Trips
Check out our schedule of upcoming field trips and mobile learning labs!