The deadline for applying to become certified (or re-certified) as an EcoSchool is less than two weeks away! From a TDSB-networked computer log into EcoSchools Online Certification. Remember to press the Submit button when you are finished.

Help is at hand!   

Need help getting on-line? Contact Mary Lovett at 416.395.2437 or Mary.Lovett@tdsb.on.ca.  To reset your password contact Wendy Abbot at 647.224.4382 or Wendy.Abbot@tdsb.on.ca.

Once your application is submitted, Ecoschools staff will set up a time for an auditor to come to your school in May or June.

EcoSchools Section 4: Questions 4.1-4.6

Evergreen and TDSB EcoSchools combine resources to deliver four days of Mapping Pathways into Effective Environmental Education.  

The Institute will provide you with activities and lesson plans to  

meet EcoSchools ecoliteracy expectations while addressing the  

environmental emphasis in the Ontario Curriculum.  

Explore teaching and learning across subject

areas in stimulating natural contexts. Work in grade groupings to enhance your learning. Come with a colleague to make it easier and more fun to take your ideas for "learning trails" back to your home school.

Workshop leaders: Hilary Inwood (Arts Educator, OISE), Pamela Miller (Etobicoke Field Studies Centre), with classroom teachers

Location: Runnymede JPS, featuring the Outdoor Classroom and Nature Study area, and in the nearby Humber River watershed.

Date: August  22-25, 2011 (9:30 am-3:30 pm) 

Limit of 35 spaces. First-come, first served.

To register: Go to Key to Learn>Teacher-Elementary>Professional Growth>SBR EcoSchools. (There is a $50 materials fee.) 

For more details contact Erin Wood at erin.wood@tdsb.on.ca or 416.697.1949.  Download the flyer.  

EcoSchools Section 1: Question 1.6; Section 4: Question 4.5; Section 5, Question 5.5

Getting a Bike, and Creative Activism.

Location: Evergreen Brick Works,  

550 Bayview Avenue

NOTE: Funds for teacher release are not provided. 

To register: For more details contact Erin Wood  at 416.697.1949 or erin.wood@tdsb.on.ca. Download the flyer.

EcoSchools Section 4: Questions 4.1-4.3 

This is a great opportunity to take students outside to sharpen their observation skills. Whether it's the natural or the built environment, there are lots of layers to peel away to understand the interconnections between the two.

The natural environment: learning on the school ground

Help students see the flow of energy, cycles of matter and life webs. The EcoSchools Toolkit has many resources to help you. Click on any of the links below to obtain a pdf:

Fundamentals: "How Nature Works" 

Tips for Teaching Outdoors 

Education in the Environment: Interpretive Hikes 

Education in the Outdoor Classroom: Learning Trails 

The built environment: an Electricity Walk

Often spoken of as one of the hardest things to teach, electricity is made visible during this walk through revealing its infrastructure. A set of PowerPoint slides gives you photos to identify its parts. Make your walk as simple or as complex as suits your students' learning needs. Instructional Leader Steve Bibla waxes poetic in describing this infrastructure, and issues a challenge:

Outdoors it hangs above our heads nodding in the wind. Indoors it weaves a hidden web through studs and joists throughout our built environment. Go on! Electrify the kids.

The interconnections between the two

Understanding nature's "ecosystems services" helps us realize that whenever we build something, we are drawing on Earth's resources.

EcoSchools Section 1: Questions 1.1, 1.6; Section 2: Questions 2.1.2, 2.1.4; Section 4: Question 4.5; Section 5: Question 5.7

In-school Earth Hour--29.9% reduction...our highest yet,

topping the 27.8% 2009 result!

Earth Hour weekend--3.95% reduction. 

This modest reduction occurred perhaps in part because when schools are closed many conservation measures are already in place. 

As someone at the City of Toronto once said, "Our schools can lead the way!  Congratulations everyone! Don't stop now!

Earth Hour in our schools

Thank you to teachers from Millwood, Dublin Heights, and Parkdale who sent us accounts of their school activities. You can read them by clicking here. We are happy to add your stories--just contact us and we'll upload them to our website.

Earth Day is now a middle-aged environmental event, sometimes moved aside by its flashier, more tightly focussed offspring Earth Hour. But it still remains an important time to re-commit to living and learning "as if the planet really mattered." Thanks to the students at satec@WA Porter Academy for introducing us to an exquisite Nature 

Conservancy video with Jason Mraz's sound track "I'm Yours" that had the 

whole auditorium singing and clapping. 

And in that moment we though "we want to share this with our newsletter readers!"

Earth Day, officially April 22nd, will be recognized on Thursday, April 21st in most of our schools. At satec the whole month is studded with engaging student-run events. We'd love to know how it is celebrated at your school. Write to us--especially if you have discovered inspiring videos or books, or created something that we could help you share with others!

EcoSchools Section 4: Question 4.3

Spring is the beginning of the new bee season. The life cycle of the honey bee is a fascinating way to illuminate science topics and nature's interconnectedness in many grades. This presentation will help students grasp how our future depends on pollination as an essential service of nature's ecosystems. Students will view a short PBS film and have safe hands-on experience with a beekeeper's hive equipment, hive boxes, tools, the smoker, the veil and gloves. Includes a taste of local honey, and a generous question and answer period. 

Cost: $225 for 3 presentations at the school

Contact: clairearfin@hotmail.com  

EcoSchools Section 2: Questions 2.1.2-2.1.4

Developed by Toronto Public Health, the 20/20 The Way to Clean Air program offers teachers a way to help students apply their learning about energy conservation in school and at home. Written at a Grade 5 reading level, the 20/20 Planner is available to teachers and students of all grades. As of March 25th, 1350 of our students have taken part in the program this year.

To register your classroom and order free print copies of the 20/20 Planner, call 416-338-8070 or go to the website.  

You will receive a copy of the NEW 20/20 TDSB Teacher's Guide, a colourful poster and stickers. 

Preview the other resources available (including 13 lesson plans) by going to www.toronto.ca/health/airquality/2020/ecoschools.htm 

Cooperation in nature, cooperation in EcoSchools

Cooperation though networks of organisms working together is a  

defining feature of ecosystems.  

So why don't we see cooperation in nature? Our brains are tuned to animals. That's what gets our attention first when we look at an ecosystem. Why do we favour them? It's pretty simple: they're big and they move.  Sometimes their movement is exhilarating, as when a predator hunts down its prey. The cooperative work of thousands of organisms, most of them too small to see with the unaided eye, is so tightly bound, that ecosystems would collapse without them. Because it is less dramatic, this essential cooperative activity may escape us.

In nature, cooperation through the action of thousands of organisms small and large ensures that water is clean, air is pure, and soil is alive. Nature has a lesson for us: by working together, by sincerely cooperating at different levels, we can at least begin to approach the clever cooperation that surrounds us.  A school is an ecosystem too. And teamwork brings an EcoSchool to life!

Read about examples of cooperation in nature, including a simple and stunning example of cooperation found in the Cassandra PS Tree Tour that you can share with your students--and then find on a nearby tree!

This day of family fun includes green exhibits, gardening displays and vendors, nature/garden/composting workshops, kid-focussed activities, and a Jane's Walk along the Scarborough Bluffs. Hosted by St Agatha's SAS Stewards of the Earth and the Cardinal Newman Tree Huggers in partnership with Live Green Toronto, BEAN (Biodiversity Education and Awareness Network), TRCA , Evergreen, and the Toronto Zoo and located in an area of great natural beauty, this event will be packed with ideas for new learning opportunities.

Any EcoSchools wanting to set up a display booth with your school's energy, waste, recycling or greening initiatives and accomplishments should contact Anne Marie McCowan and Liza Tilander at 416.393.5302 (day) or stagathaecoteam@hotmail.ca 

Date and time: Saturday May 7, 11 am-3 pm

Location: Blessed Cardinal Newman High School, 100 Brimley Rd S at Kingston Road

"April is the busiest month" as T.S.Eliot might have said if he could visit our EcoSchools! With Earth Day/Week/Month events and getting ready for the audit, we know that you are tackling many tasks to reach all your environmental goals. Your accomplishments don't go un-noticed--certainly not by our auditors!--but neither do they get the recognition they deserve. Thank you, EcoTeams, from the central team for making a difference in your schools and in the lives of your students. Your actions large and small in mentoring students and encouraging your colleagues add up to a vivid example of environmental citizenship at work. It takes time, true grit, and sometimes courage as well. Where in the world would we be without you?  Happy Earth Day! 

Best wishes,

Eleanor Dudar and Jenn Vetter