| Program Description | Part One
STORYTELLING/SLIDE PRESENTATION (60 MINUTES)
Jeff falls asleep one night and dreams of becoming a killer whale. He follows the matriarch of “J pod,” and experiences the complex relationships whales share with each other and the environment around them. Waking from the dream, Jeff returns to the real world with a new curiosity and the desire to make a difference. The story is told through immersive performance, informational slides, video clips, tactile exploration of casted and real orca bones, and students mimicking real orca calls.
Part Two
ACTIVITIES (UP TO 60 MINUTES)
Here we “bring the field to the classroom.” Through one or more of our NGSS supported program activities (https://killerwhaletales.org/activities/) students participate in experiential/role playing games created to introduce them to current orca research. Using data collected throughout the previous year by NOAA scientists, students become young researchers who identify orca whales, track their movements, learn basic whale behaviors and practice their observational skills for scientific discovery. They will leave with a working understanding of the complexities of these magnificent animals and how dependent they are on a healthy and diverse environment.
Part Three
AT HOME CONSERVATION PROJECT
This take-home activity challenges students to identify and record their ecological footprints and to mitigate their effects. The activity starts with the participants examining and recording what they find in their home, noting things like their families purchasing choices and energy consumption. With these baselines established, students are then given simple strategies to lessen their impact. Students are then asked to return their results to their teacher and they in turn forward them on to us. We create a summary "conservation report card" infographic for each class and return those to the teacher along with the deidentified data set for any additional graphing and analysis the teacher would like to perform. By the end of the school year, KWT will post the results from all participating schools on this website (example of the 2018-2019 overall infographic http://killerwhaletales.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/01/KWT-KMAD-2018-2019.pdf), proving what we believe - that kid’s can make a difference-now!
Part Four (optional)
DEEP DIVE (UP TO FOUR 60-MINUTES ONLINE SESSIONS)
Each online session (held on Friday mornings) can involve multiple schools/classrooms and will allow students to learn more from Jeff, or another orca scientist, and from each other. Each session will begin with discussion of an in-depth topic (a specific whale behavior, the purpose and evolution of a specific set of anatomical features, a look at the life-cycle of the Southern Resident Killer Whale’s primary food source – Chinook salmon, how to become an orca scientist, etc.) and will include an related interactive game followed by open forum for Questions and Answers. |