A. E. Burdick School's Journey to Becoming a Green & Healthy School

A. E. Burdick School is a K-8 neighborhood school with approximately 630 students located on the southeast side of Milwaukee. During nice weather, students and teachers can be found learning how plants grow from seeds, harvesting vegetables and fruits, and exploring which insects are helpful to growing crops and what plants are needed to help migratory birds and insects. Learning to grow vegetables brings up many discussions on water conservation and observation, as well as how to save energy both inside and outside of school. keep reading>>

Renewable Energy and Forestry

Renewable energy in forestry is most directly linked to examples where burning wood supplies heat for power and energy.  For example, in St. Paul, MN, they supply heat and power to about 65% of the metropolitan needs through biomass (wood)-fired combined heat and power system.  Most of the energy comes sustainable from urban wood being harvested in and around the Twin Cities area, which is then burned.  Natural gas is mixed with the wood chips in the boiler to increase the combustion temperature and add stability.  

There are many other direct and indirect connections between forestry and the production and use of energy.  All forest products require energy to make as well.  You can use this idea to teach students about energy? Project Learning Tree has a great lesson that connects science and social studies.  The activity Resource-Go-Round from PLT’s K-8 Environmental Education Activity Guide helps students gain insight into the processes and energy involved in turning a natural resource into a usable product.  You can get a glimpse of this activity on the Resource-Go-Round student page.

PLT offers a number of other resources to support energy education in the classroom. High school students can investigate these concepts in-depth through the outstanding activity Adventures in Life Cycle Assessment, from PLT’s new secondary module, Southeastern Forests and Climate Change. Other energy-related activities from the K-8 guide include Renewable or Not?, A Peek at Packaging, and Energy Sleuths. You can also purchase PLT’s Energy and Society kit, which includes activities, posters, a CD and a DVD to supplement your energy curriculum. 

Project Learning Tree’s full curriculum guides are only available by attending a PLT training. Keep your eye on LEAF’s professional development calendar for a list of open workshops (including an online training option), or contact us at wcee-plt@uwsp.edu to bring a workshop to your staff.




Celebrate National STEAM Day and Wisconsin's Forest Products Industry With LEAF!

You can celebrate National STEAM Day and Forest Products Week by checking out our new Forest Products Kit. Using the included lesson “Track that Product: From Finish to Forest” students track the finished product to the forest from which it came. To showcase what they learned in the lesson, students develop a presentation to highlight the forest product they learned about. To get an idea for the process, check out this video that tells the story of an NCAA 2012 Final Four floor from a sugar maple in the Menominee Indian Tribe of Wisconsin’s sustainable forest management to the floor itself.  (Yes, wood from Wisconsin made it to the final four!)

This lesson is part of series to accompany our eleven new Forest Products Kits located throughout the state.  We have been busy touring the state distributing the kits to our new host sites.  Contact the nearest host in your area to easily check out the kit for free. Other lessons specific to the kits include a literacy and research project on exciting and emerging biotechnology trends in the forest products industry, particularly with nanocellulose developments. The kits also include samples of nanocellulose thanks to the U.S. Forest Service Forest Products Lab, located in Madison, Wis. Additionally, we have developed a wood identification key to go with sample wood blocks that use tree physiology, cell structure, coloring and grain appearance to aid in identification.

Because drawing has been shown to reinforce learning, students sketch the cell structure and growth rings as they identify it through vessel placement and differences in early and late wood. Using the interactive key, students compare twelve specially engraved wood blocks of common Wisconsin tree species used in forest products and explore wood properties, density, and cell structure. This kit is geared to middle and high school students.

Similarly, with leaves falling and coming winter, you and your students can practice tree identification in the winter using our Winter Tree Identification Key. While doing her master’s work in at the University of Wisconsin-Stevens Pont, Janet Moore, LEAF ad-hoc instructor, combined art and drawing with the key and found that when students drew the different branch structures, it connected better with their memory. Art reinforces science learning!

Other LEAF lessons that include STEAM components are:

  • Studying Layers in the Forest, from our 5-6 Field Extensions, where students observe the structural layers of a forest and draw a color-coded picture.
  • Forest Product Time Machine in the K-1 LEAF Lesson Guide, students explore historical uses of forest resources and compare them to present day goods by surveying pictures and creating drawings.
  • Forests Are Important to Me in the 2-3 LEAF Lesson Guide, students explore forest values and discover what forest products come from Wisconsin using a checklist. Creative writing and an art project help students examine why they value forests.
  • Sustaining Our Forests in the 4th grade LEAF Lesson Guide, students are introduced to the sustainability and stewardship of forests by listening to a fable, brainstorming, reading situation cards, and creating an art project.

All of these lessons celebrate Wisconsin’s forests while using STEAM to explore and learn.



Celebrate-Forest-Products-Week-Image.pngHow Do Animals Survive the Cold Winter Months?

Winter’s coming! It’s getting colder and darker, and food gets scarcer.

How do things survive this time? A classic case we often learn about is a hibernating bear. That’s one strategy. Many animals store up extra fat reserves and continue foraging and hunting throughout the winter while seeking shelter in warmer places like bushy conifers.

Try a bird watching experiment in a bushy spruce vs. a leafless oak. Trees have various mechanisms of “antifreeze” (sugar and alcohol production) and dehydration, so they don’t explode cells with the expansion of freezing water. Insects go into a state of diapause that drops their metabolic rate down to one tenth or less of normal, so they can survive on stored body fat and the production of “antifreezes.”

Some frogs like the wood frog and spring peeper burrow and completely freeze themselves (to heart stopping point) and then, boom!, come back to life in a sort of cryonic sci-fiction future way. Surviving winter is a challenge for everyone.

Challenge students to connect some of these behaviors to the whole ecosystem through various LEAF lessons. For example, in LEAF 2-3 Lesson Guide, Lesson 2, What Makes a Forest? students match plants and animal species with forest ecosystems and create a song or skit to show what they have learned about living and non-living connections. Or adapt K-1 Lesson 5: Animals Need Forests Too in which students explore what the forest provides for its animal residents and create a forest ecosystem which they enter in search of food.

It might be fun to apply these lessons to humans. Clearly, we construct shelters and wear warmer clothing for warmth, but what about the nutritional component before there were grocery stores? Indigenous people, pioneers, early farmers, and some people today, put significant effort into collecting and preserving food during the growing months in order to have supplies through winter. Get into the mindset of other eras using the book Wisconsin Forest Tales, which tell short stories through time, to see how people connected to the forest.

That said, there’s still some foraging possible in the winter. Warm up to the idea by making some pine needle tea for a hands-on learning experience for students to connect. Note: avoid pine look a-likes like yews. Pine, spruce, and fir needles are edible and rich in antioxidants, vitamin C, and other nutrients. This tea helped prevent scurvy and kept vitamin levels high during the long winter months when other vitamin rich foods were scarce. If this foraging idea appeals to you, begin to plan how to use your school forest as an edible forest garden from which you can harvest, preserve, dry and eventually eat forest foods throughout the year by checking out our Edible Forest Reference Kit.

Don’t forget, all these lessons can meet literacy standards too. Learn how on January 24, at Developing Elementary Literacy through Outdoor Learning at CESA 11 in Turtle Lake or Addressing Middle and High School Disciplinary Literacy through Forestry Education at CESA 11 in Turtle Lake.

*Note, anytime doing foraging or edibles in the classroom, be sure to emphasize safety and knowledge as misidentified plants can be poisonous.






Celebrate-Forest-Products-Week-Image.pngCelebrate Forest Products Week: October 21 - 27, 2018

Did you know Wisconsin's forest industry grows about double what it harvests annually? This makes Wisconsin's forests a sustainable resource that support our state's economy! 

Please join LEAF in celebrating the important role forest products play in Wisconsin’s economy and ecology with LEAF lessons in your classroom, your school forest, and even in your schoolyard!

Or, challenge your students with these trivia questions from a newly developed LEAF lesson called Track that Product: From Finish to Forest. In this lesson, students choose one of 13 common Wisconsin forest products and learn how it is produced and the ecology of the tree species from which it is created.

Questions:
  1. How many people does the forest products industry employ in Wisconsin?
  2. How many acres of forested land does Wisconsin have?
  3. To how many countries do Wisconsin forest products usually travel per year? 
  4. What is the value of Wisconsin forest products exports in US Dollars? How many dollars worth of forest products does Wisconsin export annually?
  5. By percent, what is the top forest product exported from Wisconsin?
  6. How much capital do Wisconsin’s public and private lands generate through forest products?

Answers:
  1. 60,000 people directly (including logging and support). More than 100,000 when you consider indirect employment.
  2. More than 17 million acres.
  3. 117 countries around the world.
  4. About $2.2 billion.
  5. Paper and paperboard make up about 60 percent, followed by printed books and newspapers at about 20 percent, and wood, articles of wood, and wood furniture at about 20 percent.
  6. $24.1 billion.

This lesson is part of a series that accompanies our 11 new Forest Products Kits that are now available for checkout and are conveniently located throughout the state. 

Other lessons specific to the kits include a literacy and research project on exciting and emerging biotechnology trends in the forest products industry, particularly with nanocellulose developments.

The kits also include samples of nanocellulose thanks to the U.S. Forest Service Forest Products Lab, located in Madison, Wisconsin. A wood identification key is included to go with the sample wood blocks that uses tree physiology, cell structure, coloring, and grain appearance to aid in identification. In using the interactive key, students can compare 12 specially engraved wood blocks of common Wisconsin tree species used in forest products and explore wood properties, density, and cell structure. This kit is geared toward middle and high school students.

For the younger audiences and opportunities related to forest products, check out the following LEAF lessons:
  • Forest Product Time Machine in the K-1 LEAF Lesson Guide, students explore historical uses of forest resources and compare them to present day products by surveying pictures and creating drawing
  • Forests Are Important to Me in the 2-3 LEAF Lesson Guide, students explore forest values and discover what forest products come from Wisconsin using a checklist. Creative writing and an art project help students examine why they value forests
  • Sustaining Our Forests in the 4th grade LEAF Lesson Guide, students are introduced to the sustainability and stewardship of forests by listening to a fable, brainstorming, reading situation cards, and creating an art project. 
  • What is Management of the 5-6 LEAF Lesson Guide students discover what has happened in Wisconsin's history that led us to modern forestry and about management techniques by creating a timeline and reading a choose your own adventure story. 

You can also check out LEAF's video Made in Wisconsin for a look at how Wisconsin’s forest products industry drives the state economy or take a look at the latest installment of Into the Outdoors to learn about sustainable forestry and follow a product from its forest origins to finished product.

There’s truly something for everyone! So, please help us celebrate the bustling forest products industry in Wisconsin by exploring these resources.



UW-Stevens Point Students Integrate Environmental Education in the Classroom

Kendra Liddicoat, PhD

It’s one thing to read about environmental education activities. It’s quite another to implement them, especially if you are new to teaching.

That’s why all WCEE professional development workshops include an opportunity to experience activities from our curricula. This spring, environmental education and interpretation majors at UW-Stevens Point took their learning one step further.

After participating in KEEP and Project Learning Tree workshops in class, they prepared their own lesson plans and taught them to second and third graders at McDill Elementary School in Stevens Point. Some classes bundled up and walked out to the registered school forest on site to explore habitats and food chains or observe trees.

Other classes investigated energy production through Digging for Coal and Waterwheels, Windmills, and Turbines.

The college students discovered how long (or short) 30 minutes is, how important behavior management is in the outdoor environment, and how many great questions second and third graders can ask.

The McDill Elementary teachers got to observe their students interacting with new adults and enjoying the outdoors. And the children learned about their natural environment through hands-on activities. A win-win situation!

Looking for curriculum resources or help taking your students outside? Consider partnering with one of the many colleges and universities in Wisconsin that include Project Learning Tree in their teacher preparation programs! PLT training is also available for future early childhood educators.

Your Summer Prescription: Nature Rx

Susan Schuller

The pressures of teaching increase every year with tighter budgets, decreased instructional support, and increased mental health needs of our students. We all want kids to breath fresh air, reduce their stress, and be all around happier.

We want learning targets to connect students to their place and community around them. We want time outdoors experiencing joyful activities.

The answer is simple: step outside and into nature! Time outside has proven to reduce stress. Fresh air reduces illness. Nature simply makes us all happier. We believe that teachers need to be well to teach well.

This summer, take time out to connect, explore, and engage in nature through the WCEE’s Summer Workshop Series. One of the newest offerings is “Disconnect to Reconnect - Building Your Wellness and Wonder through Nature.” Spend a day experiencing guided nature wellness exercises outlined in the award-winning book by Joseph Bharat Cornell, The Sky & Earth Touched Me. Become inspired by nature. Experience joyful learning. And simply spend the day learning ways to pause, ground yourself, and reconnect with the natural world.

David Sobel, author of Childhood and Nature: Design Principles for Educators (2008) says, “Wet sneakers and muddy clothes are prerequisites for understanding the water cycle.” Let’s get our hands dirty and feet wet together as we engage in joyful experiences in the forest for a day. Nature is your prescription for this day. Leave with techniques for building wellness through nature and igniting the sense of wonder in your students. For more information on this workshop and others offered in the WCEE Summer Workshop Series, visit our Summer Workshop Series webpage.

Burlington Students Become the Experts in Energy Efficiency

Students Lead Energy Audit in Stevens Point Area School District

Jenny Christopher

As part of a project called Stevens Point 2050, students at Point of Discovery School (PoDS) conducted energy audits of all schools and buildings in the Stevens Point Area School District in 2017. The students measured and compiled data on light levels, electricity consumption, and thermostat settings, in addition to analyzing school building energy bills from the last year. Conducting these audits provided students with much needed perspective on energy use and the economics behind both renewable and non-renewable resources. The students presented their findings and made recommendations about increasing efficiency and lowering costs at a community open house and at the MREA Energy Fair. The Wisconsin K-12 Energy Education Program (KEEP) collaborated with PoDS staff in the development of the project and provided the measurement tools students used in conducting the audits.

Burlington Students Become the Experts in Energy Efficiency

Burlington Students Become the Experts in Energy Efficiency

Jenny Christopher

Students in grades 4th – 6th from Dyer Intermediate in Burlington participated in energy efficiency training and then took their newfound best practices into their community educating over 500 attendees during the school’s annual Energy Expo. Wisconsin K-12 Energy Education Program (KEEP) staff provided Dyer students first-hand experience analyzing how energy is used at school, where they practiced using technology to calculate energy consumption and efficiency of common lighting fixtures and appliances. The students walked away prepared to teach others in their community and at home how to save energy and the advantages. Community members attending the Expo were encouraged to calculate how much money they would save by switching to LED lightbulbs.

Christmas Tree Bulbs Learning from Wisconsin's Christmas Tree Industry

Nicole Filizetti

December 6, 2017

This time of year, it becomes easy to see the importance of the Christmas tree industry in Wisconsin. Rows of Christmas trees line shopping mall parking lots, scouts and schools host wreath sale fundraisers, and families visit their favorite local tree farms to choose and cut their own tree. Within this holiday hustle and bustle, let’s take a moment to consider this aspect of our state’s economy and environment.

Although all 50 states produce Christmas trees, Wisconsin is among the leading states for this crop. According to the 2014 United States Department of Agriculture Census of Horticultural Specialties, Wisconsin ranks 5th in the nation for Christmas tree production, with over $16 million in Christmas tree sales annually. Along with the perennial favorites of balsam fir and Fraser fir, Wisconsin Christmas tree farmers also grow Canaan fir, Scotch pine, white pine, and spruce. Data from the Wisconsin Christmas Tree Producers Association (WCTPA) shows that over 23,000 acres of Wisconsin forestland is dedicated to Christmas tree production, though the majority of Christmas tree farms (51 percent) are less than 10 acres in size. These trees are sold directly off the farm in “Cut Your Own” operations, but are also brought to urban centers for resale, and sold wholesale to tree dealers in other states.

The Christmas tree industry in Wisconsin is a great example of sustainable forestry, with two to three trees replanted for every tree cut. A tree farm provides early successional forest habitat for a variety of plants, animals, and invertebrates, sometimes supporting entire ecosystems—including predators like foxes and bobcats. The waste from Christmas tree production is decomposable, and can add nutrients back into the soil of the tree farm.

After the holiday season is over, Christmas trees themselves can go on to become mulch or firewood, or can be used in aquatic habitat restoration or even used in woodworking projects. If you’d like to read more about the environmental benefits of real Christmas trees over artificial trees, a Life Cycle Assessment is available from the WCTPA, on the bottom of this page.

In addition to LEAF’s K-12 Forestry Education Curriculum, a number of educational resources are available to help you connect your students with this relevant sustainable forestry topic. The Wisconsin Christmas Tree Producers Association provides teacher resources on their webpage, and Wisconsin Ag in the Classroom provides resources as well. The Wisconsin Tree Farm Committee and Wisconsin Woodland Owners Association may also be of use as you plan a Christmas tree-themed learning experience. Do you have a great lesson you teach that involves Christmas tree production? If so, contact LEAF to share it with us, and you may be featured in a future News to Note article!

Holiday Lights Lighten your (Plug) Load this Holiday Season

Jenny Christopher

December 6, 2017

The tradition of displaying lights on a tree began long before Thomas Edison invented the electric light. Unfortunately, that meant tree branches donned lit candles as the favored holiday décor. As one could imagine, this produced many dangerous structure fires. Holiday lights have come a long way since the first time they lit up a mid-town Manhattan apartment during the Christmas of 1882. In 1900, a single string of lights cost around $300 in today’s money! The new incandescent bulbs were much safer than a candle, but they still produced heat and could spark if they malfunctioned.

Today, the new light emitting diode (LED) holiday lights are the most energy efficient and cost-effective way to decorate. They use 70-80 percent less energy than incandescent holiday lights and they last ten times longer. Switching from incandescent lights to LEDs makes your electrical load more than seven times smaller and has the same effect on your holiday electric bill. Additionally, they have no filaments or glass to break, and cost similar to their standard light counterparts. What a holiday marvel!

Tip: Too many sets of bulbs connected together can cause a circuit breaker to trip. Most circuits are typically 15 to 20 amps, but should only carry up to 80 percent of that load.

Let the Inquiry Begin!

This is a great opportunity to bring a relevant topic into the classroom! Holiday light planning is important and can answer many questions like,

  • How many watts and amps do my holiday lights use? 
  • How much could my family save if we put our lights on a timer instead of having them on all night?
  • How many lights can I run off a single outlet or circuit?
  • How many light strings can I connect together?
  • How much power and money can I save with LED lights? 
  • If all the houses on my block switched to LED lights, how much would we save? 

 

Calculate holiday electricity usage by using the helpful math below.

Using a Watt Meter can help you figure out how many watts each string of lights will use. Borrow our Watt Meter Kit free!

  • Watts/1000 = kw
  • kw x 5 hours a day = kwh/day
  • kwh/day x 30 days = kwh/month
  • Kwh/month x .14 cents (or your cost of power usage found on your electric bill) = cost
  • Are you teaching physics? Study how LED lights work verses incandescent lights. 

 

Download activities related to lighting, plug load and reading utility meters from the K-12 Energy Education Program.

Holiday Lighting Energy Saving Tips

 

  1. Use LED light strings.
  2. Set timers for lights to automatically turn on when it gets dark and off in the middle of the night.
  3. Look for rebates on ENERGY STAR® qualified lighting at your local hardware store. 
  4. Use reflective decorations instead of adding more lights.
  5. Use a holiday lighting calculator to estimate the energy costs of your lights, like this one from Wisconsin Public Service. 
  6. Use lighting fixtures less if you have decorated with holiday lights bright enough to light the room. 

Fun Fact: A household with an extravagant Christmas light display will spend enough money to heat and power an average house for six weeks, and produce 882 pounds of carbon dioxide - more than enough to fill two double-decker buses.

Source: http://www.hgtv.com/

Nicole-for-Website-Circle.gif Teaching Forestry Through "Buck Fever"

Nicole Filizetti

November 1, 2017

As the leaves begin to fall and the weather turns chilly, many Wisconsin residents start preparing for the annual white-tailed deer hunting season. Indeed, overall hunting-related spending in our state can average $2.5 billion, according to the Department of Natural Resources. Such intense interest in a topic so closely connected to forestry provides an opportunity to turn “buck fever” into a teachable moment. If you are looking to bring the subject of deer hunting into your middle or high school classroom, the LEAF Program has resources to help.

Students may be curious about what makes a good habitat for white-tailed deer. Instead of simply telling them, why not let them discover the answer through research and scientific observation? In LEAF’s high school field experience lesson Habitat Assessment, students research the specific habitat requirements of by an animal such as white-tailed deer, then develop a list of habitat components that would meet that animal’s needs. Next, students become scientists by developing a habitat assessment protocol, then conduct the assessment in the school forest or other nearby woodland. Finally, students analyze their data to decide whether that location would serve as a good habitat for the animal or not. All along the way, they are recording data, communicating observations, making comparisons, and generally practicing 21st century skills. All of this from an interest in deer hunting!

For a lesson that explores how the management of white-tailed deer populations influences forest management, take a look at the 7th-8th grade lesson Forest Management Issues. In this lesson, students discuss factors that can affect management decisions and examine forest management techniques to determine their effect on society, the economy, and the environment. In addition to getting into the scientific side of forest management, this lesson also provides a great opportunity to introduce how our diverse beliefs, values and knowledge affect how we view controversial issues.

How do you connect our state’s favorite fall pastime with your curriculum? We’d love to hear your success stories! If you have something to share, let us know at leaf@uwsp.edu, and maybe you’ll be featured in a future News to Note article!

Nicole-for-Website-Circle.gif Teaching About Food-related Energy Consumption

Dan Martinson

November 1, 2017

According to the US Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) Economic Research Service (ERS), food-related energy usage in the United States grew by nearly 8 percent from 2002 to 2007, while the nation’s total energy usage fell by nearly 1 percent over the same period. During that time, the ERS estimates that total food-related energy use grew from 14.4 percent of the nation’s total energy consumption to 15.7 percent.

The USDA identifies three factors that have driven the increase in food-related energy usage in the United States: an increase in population, a marked increase in the amount and variety of food marketed to U.S. consumers, and greater use of energy-intensive technologies to reduce manual labor in both industry and in our homes and to transport our food.

As consumers, we are unable to control factors such as population increase and the growing number of food products introduced to the marketplace. However, we can influence our food-related energy consumption in the kitchen and to some degree in the transportation of our food.

According to the USDA, United States’ households were the largest food-related energy consumers, accounting for roughly 29 percent of the country’s total food-related energy consumption. Relatively common labor saving culprits like blenders and food processors as well as appliances that are plugged in round-the-clock like the refrigerator (and often a second one in the basement) collectively require a great deal of energy to run.

Likewise, it is estimated that the average American meal is transported about 1,500 miles from farm to table. Though transportation is a relatively small percentage of our overall food-related energy consumption, it is easy to influence by buying locally produced food from a farmers’ market or grocer who supports local farmers, signing up for a nearby Community Supported Agriculture (CSA), or starting or working in a school garden!

The resources below will help students and teachers investigate the energy consumption of common appliances and learn how their school can start a school garden program – two great first-steps for students learning to reduce their food-related energy consumption.

    Home appliance energy consumption
    Wisconsin’s K-12 Energy Education Program (KEEP) has resources designed to help students understand their family’s energy in-home energy consumption:
  • KEEP’s online and printable Appliance Survey teaches students, parents, and teachers how to calculate the energy consumption of various appliances, giving them a great understanding of how to reduce energy consumption and costs in the kitchen and around the house.
  • The Watt Meter Kit, highlighted in this month’s hands-on resources, is a tool that can be used to measure the electric usage of appliances. Learn more | Reserve the Watt Meter Kit
    Starting a school garden
    Wisconsin is lucky to have a variety of resources for those interested in starting or expanding a school garden.
  • The Wisconsin School Garden Network is dedicated to supporting Wisconsin’s expanding school garden movement. From curricula and planning to help maintaining and sustaining your school garden, their website is full of wonderful resources that will help get you started or maintain and expand your existing garden.
  • You can also contact them at info@wisconsinschoolgardens.org to get more personalized assistance.






Nicole-for-Website-Circle.gif Cutting-edge Building Supplies from the Forest!

Nicole Filizetti

October 4, 2017

If you were asked to think about examples of cutting-edge building materials, wood might not make your list. However, the use of lumber and engineered wood products is actually a very hot topic in the world of building construction and engineering today. Use of wood products is increasing in both commercial and residential building, for reasons related to environmental sustainability, aesthetics, cost, and design flexibility. The Engineered Wood Association expects the demand for engineered wood products to grow between 19 and 25 percent from 2015 to 2019.

This growth in the use of wood products is largely the result of advancements in engineered wood products. Going far beyond standard lumber, contemporary architects design buildings that make use of products like cross-laminated timber (CLT), glue-laminated lumber (Glulam), and laminated veneer lumber (LVL). As the common keyword "laminated" suggests, these products combine adhesives with wood boards, strands or veneer to create wood composites that are both strong and lightweight. In many instances, these products are able to use smaller and lower-grade lumber that might otherwise be considered waste.

Why are wood products considered a more sustainable building choice? For starters, wood is a renewable resource, and wood products that come from sustainably managed forests are part of a cycle that creates economic, ecologic and social benefits. Furthermore, wood products win out over steel and concrete in most "footprint" comparisons, with wood products using significantly less energy during production and releasing far fewer greenhouse gas emissions than both concrete and steel. Finally, wood buildings can be very energy efficient, thanks to the thermal properties of wood, and can help homeowners reduce both energy bills and their carbon footprint.

Analyzing the environmental sustainability of building with wood can be a powerful learning experience for students. In LEAF's high school lesson Forest Science and Technology, students complete a Life Cycle Analysis of wood, steel and concrete to determine the energy use and pollution created by all three products. Students then go a step further by researching and suggesting ways to make the production and distribution of wood products even more energy efficient. This highly interdisciplinary lesson could be a great opportunity for collaboration between the science, math, and economics teachers at a school. For more sustainable forestry education resources, explore LEAF's K-12 curriculum.

Susan-Outdoors-Circle.png Renewal, reflection, and reigniting passions

By Susan Schuller

September 6, 2017

Summer is often a time of renewal, reflection, and relaxation for teachers and we hope you have made time for that. At the WCEE, summer is a time of deep discovery for what is growing and changing in our backyard and natural communities. It is a time of learning from each other sharing garden tips or identifying the many green plants growing around us. It is also a time of sharing great sites, secret swimming holes, or hiking spots. As a basis for our summer workshop professional development (PD) series for teachers, we took a different approach this year. We unleashed our passion for the environment and let it guide our workshops. Using the staffs' interests, skills, and excitement for the natural world, an engaging workshop series for teachers was created. The series was designed to spark the interest of learning in nature, by nature, and through nature's teachings. 

Rachel Carson left these words in her book A Sense of Wonder (1956):

If I had influence with the good fairy who is supposed to preside over the christening of all children, I should ask that her gift to each child in the world be a sense of wonder so indestructible that it would last throughout life, as an unfailing antidote against the boredom and disenchantments of later years, the sterile preoccupation with things that are artificial, the alienation from the sources of our strength.

If a child is to keep alive his inborn sense of wonder without any such gift from the fairies, he needs the companionship of at least one adult who can share it, rediscovering with him the joy, excitement and mystery of the world we live in.

Research continues to alarm us of the increasingly disconnection we have to our natural world. Richard Louv's 2005 book, Last Child in the Woods: Saving our Children from Nature-Deficit Disorder, provided a call to action to get kids outdoors and into nature. Over 10 years later, we, as a society, struggle to find time to disconnect from the day-to-day, and engage in the natural world supporting our existence. Natural communities are becoming foreign worlds, filled with unknowns. It becomes challenging to use the environment as a context for student learning, when we do not have strong knowledge of or comfort teaching in natural communities. 

That is where the WCEE comes in: to guide educators to use the natural environment as a way to create "joy, excitement, and mystery" in their teachings. That became the basis of our summer workshop series for educators. In June, a new PD model was launched based on staff passions, skills, and excitement. When taught by an instructor who is passionate and excited about what they are teaching, the enthusiasm is contagious. With that zeal, we designed an environmental education PD model with the purpose of igniting educators' excitement for the environment; arming them with skills and tools to implement lessons learned in their curriculum; and, overall, increasing their environmental literacy.  

This summer 38 educators increased their knowledge and skills to help release a sense of wonder in children to discover the many mysteries of our natural world and engage in learning using a place just a step outdoors. Hear what people are saying about these workshops:

"I was impressed with the experience and knowledge of our presenters. I left with numerous lessons that I am planning on using in my classroom and also in my personal life."  

"I took the bird class and sustainability class. Both were a lot of fun and gave me a ton of ideas for incorporating ideas into some of the programming I do. We also got a huge supply of resources." (

As we continue to move into the fall, the WCEE is committed to providing opportunities for educators to tap our natural world for learning opportunities across all disciplines including English language arts, social studies, science, technology, and agriculture education. To learn more about the upcoming offerings this fall and into next summer, please visit our professional development page.