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Showing 32 results for dark skies ...

Hawaiʻi Volcanoes National Park

Activities for Home - Dark Skies
  • Type: Lesson Plan
  • Grade Levels: Upper Elementary: Third Grade through Fifth Grade

Night Sky over Kīlauea Caldera NPS Photo/Janice Wei

Wind Cave National Park

Surveying into the darkness
  • Type: Student Activities
  • Grade Levels: Upper Elementary: Third Grade through Fifth Grade

A mock cave survey where students use compasses to navigate along a specific path.

Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area

National Park Legacy - Light Right at Night! Grades 7 - 8
  • Type: Lesson Plan
  • Grade Levels: Middle School: Sixth Grade through Eighth Grade

The night skies division of the National Park Service promotes 6 practices that everyone can adopt and make a difference in reducing light pollution: light only where needed, light only when needed, use less light, use warm colored light, use energy efficient lamps, shield and direct lights downward.

Olympic National Park

Geology
  • Type: Field Trips
  • Grade Levels: Lower Elementary: Pre-Kindergarten through Second Grade

This program for second grade students takes place at the Hurricane Ridge Visitor Center. It involves two separate activity stations and a ranger-led nature/geology walk.

National Park of American Samoa

What is a Fruit Bat?
  • Type: Lesson Plan
  • Grade Levels: Lower Elementary: Pre-Kindergarten through Second Grade

Fruit bats are considered the only native mammal in American Samoa thus earning the right to be protected within the National Park of American Samoa. Local folklore casts a dark image on fruitbats, portraying them as sinister and devious creatures with connections to the spirit world. These superstitions undermine their ecological importance to the native tropical rainforest. Fruit bats help transfer pollen from one tree to another and are also important for seed dispersal.

Zion National Park

The Forests, Wetlands, and Deserts of Zion
  • Type: Distance Learning
  • Grade Levels: Upper Elementary: Third Grade through Fifth Grade

This distance learning program focuses on the plants and animals that live in Zion’s varying ecosystems. Students will learn about their adaptations and relationships to each other in this interactive lesson with a creative and critical thinking activity. (45 minutes)

National Park of American Samoa

Fruit Bats Are Our Friends
  • Type: Lesson Plan
  • Grade Levels: Upper Elementary: Third Grade through Fifth Grade

Fruit bats are considered the only native mammal in American Samoa thus earning the right to be protected within the National Park of American Samoa. Local folklore casts a dark image on fruit bats, portraying them as sinister and devious creatures with connections to the spirit world. These superstitions undermine their ecological importance to the native tropical rainforest. Fruit bats help transfer pollen from one tree to another and are also important for seed dispersal.

Ulysses S Grant National Historic Site

Teacher Workshops at Ulysses S. Grant National Historic Site
  • Type: Teacher Workshops & Other Programs
  • Grade Levels: Adult Education

Ulysses S. Grant National Historic Site hosts at least two teacher workshops every year. Learn more about past workshops and topics for upcoming events.

Listen, Pair, Share
  • Type: Lesson Plan
  • Grade Levels: Middle School: Sixth Grade through Eighth Grade

In this activity, participants will develop their active listening skills and their ability to isolate elements of the soundscape around them. The emphasis in the activity is on peeling away human-caused sounds to reveal the sounds of the natural world. Think-Pair-Share is a process commonly used to promote active learning. Small group discussions ensure that every person present has a chance to articulate their thoughts to at least one person.

Echoes of the Past
  • Type: Lesson Plan
  • Grade Levels: Middle School: Sixth Grade through Eighth Grade

This lesson focuses on cultural and natural sounds. Participants should visit a culturally significant site within a park for these activities. Beginning with an historic overview of the location, the facilitator will segue into a group discussion of soundscapes present and past. Participants will be introduced to a brief history of the cultural site and learn how sounds influence culture and wellbeing. Requires a facilitator. culture and wellbeing. This lesson is b

Mount Rushmore National Memorial

Math at Mount Rushmore for Grades 3, 4 and 5
  • Type: Student Activities ... Teacher Reference Materials ... Other Education Materials
  • Grade Levels: Upper Elementary: Third Grade through Fifth Grade

Students learn that more complex shapes can be partitioned into smaller, simpler, geometric shapes. Learners will be able to understand the concept of grids and symmetry, and be able to use them to make basic or more advanced area calculations.

National Park of American Samoa

Our Tropical Rainforest
  • Type: Lesson Plan
  • Grade Levels: Middle School: Sixth Grade through Eighth Grade

Most of the natural vegetation of American Samoa fits into the category of tropical rainforest. Tropical rainforests are found throughout the world in areas of warm climates and sufficient to plentiful year-round rainfall. The Samoan tropical rainforest originally extended from just inland of the shore up to the summits of the highest mountains, except on those peaks where soil factors or weather factors have created scrubby vegetation in which life forms other than tall trees are predominant.

National Park of American Samoa

Enviro Musical Chairs
  • Type: Lesson Plan
  • Grade Levels: Middle School: Sixth Grade through Eighth Grade

There's a certain mystique about the word “biodiversity” that seems to be associated with images of steamy jungles or wondrous new medicines, but the word more specifically refers to the number of species or 'species richness' of an area. One reason why tropical areas are so fascinating is that they contain the highest numbers of plant and animal species found anywhere on earth.American Samoa sits squarely in the tropics, so we should have a high biological diversity here, but we do and we don't

Rocky Mountain National Park

Sounds of Rocky
  • Type: Distance Learning
  • Grade Levels: Lower Elementary: Pre-Kindergarten through Second Grade

Rocky Mountain National Park's 415 square miles hold an expansive library of sounds- from rushing waterfalls in the spring to the sounds of elk bugling in the fall. Students will become sound scientists, performing three experiments to uncover the properties of sound and studying how three animals hear and use sound in Rocky Mountain National Park.

Paterson Great Falls National Historical Park

Learning the Land and The Passaic River & Water Power
  • Type: Distance Learning
  • Grade Levels: Upper Elementary: Third Grade through Fifth Grade

A two-part environmental science program that invites students to learn about the formation of the Paterson Great Falls and how they have been used to create power.

Arches National Park

Life Cycles
  • Type: Field Trips
  • Grade Levels: Lower Elementary: Pre-Kindergarten through Second Grade

Students explore plant changes by performing a play depicting the life cycle of a wildflower through the seasons. They explore life cycles of frogs and toads, along the way discovering the difference between them. Students learn about insect metamorphosis, focusing on moths and butterflies, and discover the surprising world of insect galls.

Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore

Climate Change at Sleeping Bear Dunes
  • Type: Distance Learning
  • Grade Levels: Middle School: Sixth Grade through Eighth Grade

The Climate Change program will introduce your students to the ways in which climate change affects the Great Lakes and Sleeping Bear Dunes and what they can do to make positive changes in their communities.

Shenandoah National Park

6th-8th Grade | Shenandoah Salamander: Climate Change Casualty or Survivor?
  • Type: Field Trips
  • Grade Levels: Middle School: Sixth Grade through Eighth Grade

The Shenandoah salamander is an endangered species found only on a few rocky slopes within Shenandoah National Park. Its survival is being threatened by changing climate and habitat competition from the more common red-backed salamander. Students will conduct field research on the red-backed salamander to compare the two salamander species’ habitat requirements and determine how climate change and habitat competition are impacting the survival.

Cuyahoga Valley National Park

The Cuyahoga Valley National Park Poetic Toolkit
  • Type: Student Activities
  • Grade Levels: Middle School: Sixth Grade through Eighth Grade

We invite teachers, students, writers, and community members to craft poems based on the stories of Cuyahoga Valley National Park. Themes include the first people in the valley, the park’s geologic history, and the Ohio & Erie Canal. Learn more about this powerful tool for creative expression developed by the Wick Poetry Center at Kent State University.

Craters Of The Moon National Monument & Preserve

Deep Time and You
  • Type: Lesson Plan
  • Grade Levels: Upper Elementary: Third Grade through Fifth Grade

Students create timelines showing significant events in Earth's history and their own lives.