Service Learning Project: Let's Clean Up Those Parks!

Title: Making the World a Better Place to Live In

Area of Service: Environment

Grade Level: 8th Grade

Subject Area: Social Studies/Geography

Summary and Description:
This project is focused on having students go to a local park and help clean up the excess trash and make it a cleaner place. Students will pick a local park that may not be up to standards in cleanliness. They will then band together in an effort to pick up trash, clean dirty bathroom areas, clean out sides of ponds and lakes, and make sure the whole park can be enjoyed by everyone, humans and animals. In the process of cleaning up the place, students will learn of the human impact on the environment and on the world around us. Students will help the local wildlife enjoy a more pleasant habitat and will also learn of ways to keep parks and other nature areas clean. They can work together with other classes, and even have people from the community help them as well. The work cannot be done all at once, and not everything will be cleaned. But if students do as much as they can, and there are many students involved, then the project will be a huge success. After each clean-up session, the students will post a blog of the work they did that day and how it can help another human or animal. In the end, students will create a video about environmental cleanliness and ways to reduce it. The video will show the students working in the park in order to raise awareness about this issue. The video can air on a local TV station to tell the community what work the students are doing and what they can do as a community to help. The goals of this project are simple: to clean up a park and raise awareness doing it. The students will learn conservation ideas and will help spread their ideas to other people.

Standards Met:
SS.8.G.5.2: Describe the impact of human modifications on the physical environment and ecosystems of the United States throughout history.

SS.8.G.2.2: Use geographic terms and tools to analyze case studies of regional issues in different parts of the United States that have had critical economic, physical, or political ramifications.

SS.8.G.3.2: Use geographic terms and tools to explain differing perspectives on the use of renewable and non-renewable resources in the United States and Florida over time.

NETS:
Communication and Collaboration Students use digital media and environments to communicate and work collaboratively, including at a distance, to support individual learning and contribute to the learning of others.
-b. communicate information and ideas effectively to multiple audiences using a variety of media and formats.

Digital Citizenship Students understand human, cultural, and societal issues related to technology and practice legal and ethical behavior.
-b. exhibit a positive attitude toward using technology that supports collaboration, learning, and productivity.

Technology Used:
Video: Making a public service video showing the students' effort at cleaning up a park and also raising awareness about environment conservation.

Blog: The students will contribute to a blog to dialogue their activities at the park and also what they learned and how they can use that to help promote conservation and cleanliness.

Assessment: The students' blogs will be graded for accuracy, participation, and usefulness. Taking part on the clean-ups will be graded on active participation (meaning no loafing around while everyone else does the work.)