Teachers on the Estuary (TOTE)

Our Apalachicola NERR education staff recently collaborated on a pair of Teachers on the Estuary (TOTE) workshops hosted by the Rookery Bay NERR education staff. This TOTE was put on as part of a collaborative partnership between the 2 NERRS and with the Everglades Foundation. The Everglades Foundation was able to provide financial support in the form of a stipend to the participating teachers, to help offset their travel costs, as well as advertising within their existing network of partner schools. These educators ran the full range of K-12 instructional teachers in public and private schools. The TOE participants engaged in a variety of engaging indoor classroom and outdoor activities, including trawling in Rookery Bay, pulling a plankton net, measuring water quality parameters using a variety of equipment, and nature journaling activities. These classroom educators learned best practices to effectively incorporate nature journaling, NOAA education resources, and Everglades Foundation curricula into their classrooms. These tools were all very well received and based on the teacher survey responses we are sure that they will make good use of these resources in their classes during the coming school year. This collaborative project gave both NERR education coordinators an opportunity to communicate and compare notes about the best ways to organize and run TOTE classes, and of course, being able to see and discuss how another NERR nature center and their educational field trips are run leads to shared ideas and innovations that can ultimately be utilized to improve all of Education programs throughout the state. Each location’s education staff all have unique strengths, approaches, and philosophies and share an understanding that teaching about our estuaries helps communities become better stewards of our precious ecosystems. ANERR education staff greatly appreciate the invitation to collaborate with our friends and colleagues. Stay tuned for more TOTE success stories, after we meet again at the GTM NERR for a three NERR collaboration at the end of the month. It is bound to continue our summer of inspiration and strengthen all our education programs throughout the state.