Water Blogged

Colleen Parker is a teacher at Simley High School in MN, who recently became a National Geographic Certified Educator. Colleen wrote a blog that was featured on the Nat Geo Certified Educator website sharing what she is doing in the classroom to inspire student advocacy. The purpose of the blog was to introduce to other Nat Geo Certified Educators ways in which students are using their learning about local, national, or world issues and how they are making a difference.  “I know I need to continue my learning with my students.”, said Colleen. Here is her blog:

UN Sustainable Development Goals
Subject Area(s) and Grade Level(s):
Special Education, College and Career Readiness Grade 9

Lesson Description
I directly taught United Nations and the 2030 goal for all Sustainable Development Goals to be addressed. Students worked in cooperative small groups to develop questions, and inquire further about what still needs to be done to reach these agreed upon goals by 2030.
Students each researched one of the UN SDG that they were interested in learning about and presented their findings and how to advocate for goals at local, state, and national level.

Adding in Scales and Perspectives
Students completed a Student Service Learning Project with H2O for Life since we were learning all about water and the environment. The entire school become involved with helping the San Jose School in Nicaragua which students chose, to build new latrines and hand washing stations. Students had no idea that running water and indoor plumbing was not in all schools.

Taking Action
Students had a hat day which was a big incentive to donate a dollar at my school. They created signs, got administrative permission, and handed the money to an H2O for Life representative at our school.