We have found that giving participants the direction, encouragement, support and time to create concrete products by the end of the Summer Institute is extremely helpful to them as they apply what they've learned in teaching. Remember, these tasks are for YOU! Completing them should give you enough of a start to be able to involve your students in schoolyard ecology learning right away. As you teach, you will have a chance to augment, refine and revise the instructional plans, working on your own and with the help of the Lead Ecologist, Lead Teacher and other SYEFEST teachers. GOOD LUCK!!!

I. THREE INSTRUCTIONAL UNITS. Develop three sets of lessons or "instructional units" for teaching your students ecology using your schoolyard.

1. Please develop one set of lessons or "instructional unit" in each of the following categories. All three could be integrated into a single, comprehensive ecology-based science unit, or they can be three stand-alone or sequential units. These can be left in list or outline form as long as the substance is clear; it is more important that the units be creative, effective and complete than they be thoroughly written out. The three units should be:
   
   1. A unit emphasizing the process of scientific inquiry, where the development of science process skills is the primary objective and students are engaged in and have control over as much of the inquiry process as possible.
      
   2. A unit exploring an important ecological concept or process that is a required part of your curriculum, where development of students’ conceptual understanding is the primary objective.
      
   3. A unit built around an on-going monitoring study or experiment looking at a question or phenomenon of interest to you.
      
2. Each set of lessons or unit should include:
   • motivating ideas and activities
   • student-centered investigations in the schoolyard
   • a list of the materials and supplies needed
   • a schedule of events and activities
   • plans for assessing student learning
   • correlation to your required curriculum
   • plans for integration with other subjects (math, social studies, art, literature)

Please write a brief (3 page maximum) review of a resource book from the perspective of an inquiry-based schoolyard ecology educator. The goals are to help you crystallize what inquiry-based teaching and ecology are, to sharpen your critical and constructive faculties, and to identify materials of use for you and your fellow participants. We will be recommending candidate materials for review, or you can propose a book on your own. You should describe the book, identify its strengths and weaknesses, and highlight ways in which it might foster, support or thwart taking a student-centered, inquiry-based approach to outdoor teaching. Are the activities book "cook book" or open-ended? Do students have the opportunity to follow their own interests and to develop deeper understandings? Are the topics important and interesting? Does the book make good use of the local environment? Does the book guide or support on-going and progressive investigations of natural phenomena and concepts?