An early snow day! Since it looks like quite a few Vermont schools are having a first snow day today and considering that some teachers may have a little extra time to spend on the Internet, I decided to publish the second blog post of the week. Yesterday, eight volunteers delivered 3,000 eggs to 25 Southwestern Vermont TU and five Connecticut River Valley TU schools. Here are some photos from our "egg marathon." (I'm pretty sure additional deliveries were taking place in other regions of the state.) Advice for new trout moms and dads Our little eggs--they are small, aren't they!--are at the most delicate stage of their existence, and they need TLC. Here's some advice for their care during this tender period of development:
Egg delivery in Ludlow Lisa Marks, 4th grade teacher at Ludlow Elementary School, sent these photos of when VTTIC volunteer Kathy Ehlers brought the eggs to LES. Some unplanned "sleepovers" At least two of our new TIC schools weren't quite ready to receive their eggs yesterday. Their tanks were still way to warm. So the volunteer deliverers improvised. They recruited two other area schools to offer to "babysit" their eggs for a few days. I've begun to speak of this as the first sleepover for these little babies. I hope they had a wonderful time! Data, data, data! Experienced TIC teachers probably get sick of me saying this, but it's important that you keep good data records, using two spreadsheets that I've linked to below. Why is this important? Well, for one, regularly using the "NEW 2019 Temp and DI record and swim-up calculator" spreadsheet will almost ensure that you don't miss the swim-up stage, the time frame when, as I said, most schools lose most of their fish. (Once all your fish are "swimming up," you can stop entering data into this file.) The other reason why it's important that teachers keep good records (and share them with our TIC support team near the end of the project) is that we are trying to learn and improve our program every year. There's surprisingly little scientific literature about what we're doing, that is, trying to raise sensitive brook trout in a classroom tank. So I think of our whole statewide TIC team of teachers as a "learning community." Together, by pooling our data and experiences, we can learn more about how to do TIC right every successive year. The spreadsheet you should enter data into now and up to the day you release your fish is this file: "Template for TIC data entry 2019." Many teachers set up a schedule whereby all students, working in small teams, will do water testing for a couple of weeks. But often these teachers also assign the job of recording the data (in the spreadsheet mentioned above) to a couple of the class's more responsible students. What's critical is that the students overseeing the whole water testing process and performing data entry make sure (a) that water testing gets done when it's supposed to and (b) that it's done and recorded accurately. National TIC/SIC Quilt Project! Annually for the past several years, Trout Unlimited's national coordinator of TIC/SIC--these days Tara Granke--has organized a Quilt Project. Many of our Vermont schools have participated and have reported that it was a fun and rewarding learning experience for teachers and students alike. Here are some photos of the wonderful and unique quilts produced by TIC students, mostly in Vermont schools. (As we learned at our TIC workshop this fall, last year Wallingford Elementary School decided to turn their collection of quilt squares into a beautiful book rather than a quilt.) The idea behind the Quilt Project is the following:
Consider signing up! Here are the details from Tara: Dear Educators, Coordinators, and Salmonid enthusiasts: It's that moment you've all been waiting for: it's time to sign up for the S/TIC Quilt Square Exchange Project. This year's theme is Stream Stewards!! Enhance STEAM learning by joining the 2019 Trout Quilt Project. Participating classes create 25 fabric art squares based on your classroom's learning in the S/TIC program. Finished squares and class letters are sent to classrooms across the country! It is a unique opportunity to share your experiences with other classrooms and you get the surprise of receiving quilt squares in the mail. The result—after sewn together—will be a beautiful, colorful quilt! Trout Unlimited staff contact is Tara Granke, [email protected]. To join or for more information visit: https://goo.gl/forms/ik8MKqaGIZBVDyGI3
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Joe Mark is Lead Facilitator of Vermont's Trout in the Classroom program.In June 2012, I retired after 40 years in higher education, having spent the last 32 years of my career as dean at Castleton. One of the first things I volunteered to do in retirement was to work with a parent-friend to help the Dorset School, where his kids and my Vermont grandkids attend, start a TIC program. Gradually that commitment grew into my current role, which is both demanding and highly rewarding. Archives
December 2019
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