Classroom Lessons with Bowman Ashe Doolin K-8 Center

Overview

On the mornings of March 10th and 12th, 2025, The International SeaKeepers Society hosted a series of classroom visits with several classes totaling 114 3rd and 79 2nd grade students over our two days at Bowman Ashe Doolin K-8 Center in Miami. Our days began with a quick introduction on SeaKeepers as an organization by our Community Engagement Associate, Lillian, and our Educational Outreach Associate, Jack. Following introductions, individual classes of 3rd graders on our first day of visits and 2nd graders on our second visited us one by one to participate in interactive discussion as well as a few activities centered on watershed dynamics, the types as well as causes and effects of pollution, and diving deeper into the plastic pollution crisis in South Florida. To do this, with each class our team led an activity modeling pollution dynamics and their effects on our oceans through the use of our Enviroscapes Model Watershed Table. Students proved to be natural scientists, identifying the most common types of pollution and making insightful guesses as to how we can reduce their impacts. After our watershed activity, students then participated in a second activity called Sink or Float, where our students had a chance to learn more about the seven major types of plastic and make guesses as to whether our samples of each would sink or float when in seawater. We concluded this activity by discussing the implications and effects of both sinking and floating marine debris and posited what kinds of marine life are affected by each outcome. We had a great time with the students of Bowman Ashe Doolin, and thank them for their hard work, participation, and excellent questions! We hope to see some of these students at future SeaKeepers events, as well as thank the faculty and staff for two great days of lessons.