1. Description of the Project

This project is designed to be integrated with a unit entitled "Seeking a Mariners Life in the Great Seaport of Boston 1776 " available on the Massachusetts PALMS Summer Institute homepage University of Massachusetts at Boston Harbor. The aim of this unit is to empower young special needs learners to identify, appreciate, understand, and value their local watershed and the Boston Harbor drainage system through observation, data gathering, group work, summary, and interpretation. The students will take a harbor cruise, photograph, and draw shore line features attending to evidence of human impact/consequences, and its cost on marine/land animal habitats vegetation, weather patterns, signs of erosion, and the water quality of our city's greatest natural resource the Boston Harbor and its associated rivers. This feature first attracted the Puritans who prospered from fishing, whaling, and shipping in the seaport we now call Boston.

Today the harbor experiences a decline in water quality due to a 200 year old practice of dumping sewage and human development which encroches on the shoreline and wetlands. The aim of this unit is to help children answer the key question: WHY IS THE CLEANUP OF THE BOSTON HARBOR WATERSHED SPECIAL AND IMPORTANT TO OURSELVES, OUR CITY, AND OUR FUTURE?

2. Grade Level:

This unit is intended for BOSTON PUBLIC SCHOOL moderate special needs elementary school aged students.

3. State Curriculum Frameworks Leaming Standards Addressed

Science
Inquiry K - 4

• to observe/describe familiar objects, identify details, similarities, differences
• to ask questions, both investigable and non investigable about objects
• to make predictions based on past experience
• to plan and conduct a simple investigation
• to extend observations using simple tools
• recognize and communicate simple patterns in data
• to describe "how" and "why" and "what if'
• to interpret findings by relating one fact to another
• to describe and communicate observations through discussions, drawings, and writings

Physical Science
Properties of Matter

• to identify the physical properties of water
• to show that properties are useful in describing, grouping, and classifying materials
• to represent that materials (Water) can exist if different states

• to describe the motion of objects (water flow)

• to represent understanding that sun provides heat/light
• to use quantitative/qualitative measurement to investigate ... concepts

• to explore/describe that plants and animals are living things
• to demonstrate understanding/classify living things

• to give examples that organism have features that help them thrive in an environment

• to understand that Earth's surface is composed of water, rocks, soil, and living organisms

• to explain how humans are influencing natural processes
• to demonstrate awareness that the earth is a collection of interconnected ecological systems
• to identify a variety of acquatic and terrestrial ecosystems

• students will solve simple computational exercises that are embeded in a simple context verify and interpret results with respect to the original problem
• apply the process of mathematical modeling to real world problems
• access and use appropriate problem - solving tools
• relate physical materials, pictures, and diagrams to mathematical ideas

• Physical Spaces, Places, Human Alterations of Environment

• Understanding of Places

4. Local District or School Curriculum Objectives:

• to observe / classify : people, places, structures
• to develop interpretation that Boston is a busy seaport
• to start students on the pathway of discovering, wondering, enjoying, gaining
• knowledge of our city's greatest natural resources
• to think purposefully about complex environmental issues
• to propell interest in stewardship of their local watershed

Waterfront Field Trip/ Shoreline Survey/ Boston Harbor Cruise Interventions Adaptations Modifications for SPED

• Make sure the students are seated near the teacher to eliminate auditory distractions. Allow the students to carry clipboards to help them focus.
• Allow the students to use colored pencils in case of mistakes.
• Use peer partners.
• Keep lesson objectives clear.
• Allow them plenty of time and practice to repeat directions they have just heard..
• Be aware you will need time to re - direct students who begin to drift.
• Use positive cues such as "Eyes of me. One two three."
• Provide the students with a pocket folder to hold the student worksheet.
• Have the students take notes, draw pictures, and complete assignments on the spot.
• Provide structure, clear rewards, and consistency.
• Clearly state the rules and rewards.
• Make a "Rule Success"grid and color in a box each time a rule is followed.
• Teach relaxation techniques.
• Allow the students to talk through possible problems and act out the steps.

• to start students on the pathway of dicovering, wondering, enjoying, gaining knowledge of our city's great natural resource, the Boston Harbor and its tributaries.
• to connect new knowledge to heritage and personal experience.
• to think purposefully about complex environmental issues.
• to propell interest in and stewardship of their local watershed.

Before the Cruise
 

• Obtain a baseline sample by completing a large group activity "What I Know About the Boston Harbor" which will assess prior knowledge to be followed by a "What I Would Like to Learn Activity" or a "Predictions Activity" to measure areas of interest, and skill levels. At the close of the unit, a concluding activity"What I Have Learned About the Boston Harbor" is an appropriate assessment tool . This design is consistent with large group Pre - Post Activity Assessment.
  
  
• Divide the task up so that individuals are responsible for specific observations such as: one group would try to draw the buildings(non living), another the wildlife(living) and so on. 
  
  
• Teach the vocabulary and main concepts and allow the children practice viewing photograhs and images of what they would be expected to draw. 
  
  
• Have plenty of large group brainstorming discussions and webbing activities to stimulate new vocabulary development by asking the children if they can think of words, for example, that help you hear the sounds of the surf, the city, etc. to generate vocabulary lists. 
  
  
• All charts should be displayed on easels in the storytime area to help student make connections to vocabulary. 
  
  
• Read thematic stories to build upon students prior knowledge such as "The Raindrop Journey", " Make Way For Ducklings", "Is This a House for Hermit Crab" and "A House for Hermit Crab"...see suggested bibliography.
  
  
  
• Provide a sample of the task to accomplish and explain. 
  
  
• Have a large group brainstorming discussion to stimulate new vocabulary development. Ask "Can you think of words that help you hear the sounds of the surf?",, for example to generate vocabulary lists to be written on a webbing chart according to category. 
  
  
• All charts should be displayed on easels in the grouptime story comer to help the students make connections to the vocabulary. 
  
  
• Ask thought provoking questions: Where are we? What is our watershed? 
  
  
• Go on a Boston Harbor Cruise so that students can observe and collect data in their environment. Conduct a shoreline survey. 
  
  
• They make a record of the conditions that exist along the coast. 
  
  
• Record vegetation, pollution sources, wildlife species, buildings, weather conditions water color, rocks, pipes, bridges, breakwaters, and land uses such as industry, roads, and degree of development. Draw attention to the great expanse of water, great bridges, tankers, tugs, sailboats and any other water craft. Point out the many white church steeples and contrasts of the blue - gray of the skyscrapers of the financial district. Illicit their thoughts regarding; crowding, other forms of transportation, the elevated central artery and related construction projects, traffic congestion, airport, trains, sights, smells, sounds, topographical features, neighborhoods, architecture, weather conditions, and evidences of any people, places, things, events of significance. Use all the shoreline vocabulary words such as: depth, banks waves, erosion, tides, shallow, driftwood, pollution... 
  
  
• Tips
• Tell the students to look for things that might have washed up on shore.
• Have them look in the air, on the water surface, and on the shore.
• Ask: What do you see? Where do the animals live?
• Examine the water
• Ask : What do you see in the water.? Rocks? Fish? Other acquatic animals? Litter? Have each group draw in the appropriate features to be comlied on a class shoreline survey back at school. 
  
  
• Related Products
• All data can be categorized and graphed. Have the students come up with a name for their classroom graph.
• Design a Poster which offers a $reward$ for information leading to the capture and arrest of anyone caught injuring any of the creatures which inhabit Boston Harbor or Massachusetts Bays such as the harbor seals, porpoises, whales, shellfish, lobsters... or draw a picture/write a story about yourself engaging in a water related commercial, sports, or recreational activity.
• Make a Model Watershed Back at the School.
• Students construct a play dough map of Massachusetts that the teacher has outlined on a box top lid paying attention to the distinct coastline and topographical features observed on the field trip including Beacon Hill, rivers: Charles, Mystic, and the Neponset. Use blue dough for the rivers and other bodies of water. Have the students construct buildings etc. from colored dough and place along the banks and near the coast to illustrate human impact. Discuss the historical degradation. 
  
  
• Map Activity
• Student Worksheet Questions
• Find the harbor and the rivers?
• Find where our house/school might be?
• What is the closest body of water? 
  
  
• Water Cycle Experiment 
  
  
• Run Off Experiment
• Have them demonstrate water flow and runoff by pouring water over beacon hill.
• Discuss how rivers, streams, ponds, creeks and wetlands all drain into the harbor and affect the water that comes out of our faucet. 
  
  
• Make Poison Soup
• Have a group discussion and ask the children to think about the need for clean drinkable water. 
  
  
• Fresh Water Salt Water Habitats
• Have the students engage in a wildlife study by constructing two habitats 
  
  
• Water Conservation Real Life Graphs
• Have the students represent varies water use by counting real empty gallon containers and construct a concrete graph depicting typical use for example: bath, shower, toilet flush, and dish washing.

• Water
• What Makes It Rain
• Raindrop Story
• Life in the Sea Life in the Pond
• Habitats
• Ocean Book
• Wonders of Rivers
• The Seashore Book
• Fish Eyes
• Waste Water
• If You Ever Meet A Whale
• Harbor

Boston Harbor Basin: Map