Plankton to Plastic Pollution Investigating the Origin of Plastic and its Impact on Earth’s Oceans as a Pollutant
Figure 6: An example of the 4 Rs By Andrew Allsup, Zoë Tauxe, Ursula Quillmann,
Mike Viney, Andrew Warnock, Courtney Butler, and Lynne Judish
W
E LIVE IN THE AGE OF PLASTIC; however, we have noticed that many students are not at all aware of how plastic is produced or the problems
it can cause as an ocean pollutant when it is discarded. Plank- ton to Plastic Pollution, is a self-guided inquiry-based kit designed to teach students about the “plastic cycle.” The kit was developed through a collaboration between oceanogra- phy professor Dr. Ursula Quillman, two of her undergraduate students (Allsup and Tauxe), and the Natural Sciences Edu- cation and Outreach Center (NSEOC) at Colorado State Uni- versity (CSU). The amount of plastic in the oceans has risen with the
near exponential increase in plastic production and use in the last 15 years. Plastics can facilitate the introduction of non-in- vasive species, entangle organisms, concentrate toxic chem- icals, and reduce an organism’s appetite.1,2
Plastics weather
by breaking down into smaller pieces called microplastics. Microplastics are small non-biodegradable pieces (less than 5 mm) that persist and become a permanent part of the marine environment and create multiple hazards to ocean life.3,4 Microplastics represent a threat to life in our oceans — a threat that must be addressed through education and public policy. Unfortunately, even some of our most effective meth- ods for educating the public about ocean environments, such as public aquariums, often present ocean environments as pristine with no pollution.5
Plankton to Plastic Pollution is a hands-on, minds-on kit
that explores the origin and problems with plastic pollution through five student-led investigations that weave together to engage the students in a compelling story tracing plastic from plankton to plastic and back to plankton. In Activity 1, microscopic examination of plankton is used to illustrate, measure, and better understand the base of the ocean food chain and ultimately the reason for why we have abundant hydrocarbons. In Activity 2, students graph real data to ana- lyze the world’s past production of plastics and to estimate future production through extrapolation. Activity 3 utilizes a 3D printed model of the ocean basins that allows students to create their own currents to explore how microplastics are moved within and between oceans. This model is then com- pared with a real-world ocean current map. In Activity 4, stu- dents use a food chain model to graph and analyze data simu- lating biomagnification: the amplification of toxic substances as they move through the food chain. The final activity helps students plan how they can help with the world’s plastic pol- lution problem using a 4R framework (refuse, reduce, re-use, and recycle). The kit is designed to work at multiple grade levels. We
have successfully used it with fourth-grade and up. Table 1 lists the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSSs) that are addressed. The booklet has been translated into Spanish and is currently being used in Colorado, Hawaii, and Mexico. Soon it will be traveling with the Semester at Sea program hosted through Colorado State University where it will be used as an outreach tool as college students make port calls to visit local schools.
Green Teacher 122 Page 3
Photos by Cathy Law
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