Interactions in the News and Literature

 

STUDENTS WILL BE ABLE TO:
- Use a variety of printed material to identify types of interactions in a range of ecosystems.
- Analyze ramifications of these interactions.

GUIDING QUESTIONS:
How do organisms affect each other?
How do people interact with ecosystems?

MATERIALS:
- Books or selections of readings

CLASS ACTIVITIES:
Note: This can be a one-time lesson/homework assignment or an ongoing project, depending on amount of written material chosen.
Day 1: Explore
1. Open lesson by reading aloud a brief selection of your choice. Give each student a written copy so that they may read along. Encourage students to make notes on their copy and underline any words they do not understand.
2. Discuss: Who or what was involved in the passage? What interactions took place?
3. Through this lesson, students will analyze interactions and effects of different organisms (including people) from newspaper articles, magazines, or books. After giving your students some background on the readings from which they may choose, allow each to pick a reading. Suggested books/authors:

• Books/authors highlighting your local ecosystem
• Song for the Blue Ocean - Carl Safina
• Overstory: Zero - Robert Leo Heilman
• Refuge - Terry Tempest Williams
• Fast Food Nation - Eric Schlosser
• The Klamath Knot - David Rains Wallace
• The River Why - David James Duncan
• Sastun: My Apprenticeship with a Mayan Healer - Rosita Arvigo
• David Orr
  
• Jane Goodall
  
• Farley Mowat
  
• Peter Matthiesen
  
• George Shaller
  
• Bill McKibben
  
• Barry Lopez
  
• Gretel Ehrlich
  
• Wendell Barry
  
• David Quammen
  
• Diana Kappel-Smith

Day 2: Share
1. Students should present their findings at the next Round Table discussion. Questions to focus on include: What types of interactions were evident among organisms in the ecosystems described? What types of interactions did humans have with the ecosystems? What are the ramifications of these interactions?
2. Return to metaphor of ecosystems as hammocks. What happens when you add, rearrange, or remove things from a hammock?
3. If students are reading short essays for a week-long project, the Round Table discussions should be completed in one day. If students are reading longer books, presentations could happen with one or two books at every Round Table discussion. Students may even wish to assign a brief selection of their books to the rest of the class for reading the evening before the presentations or may read specific passages aloud.