Archive for year: 2015
Unit 2
Students just finished unit 2 which was on watersheds. They found out which watershed they belonged to, learned what watersheds are, how we are connected to the watershed, and had a field trip to the Ventura Harbor. One assignment that was given to them was to trace where our local watersheds are then they needed to map what are the land uses are in the area. I lead a lesson called Earth’s water as an apple, students had to cut an apple to show how the Earth’s surface is divided and then how our land is divided up. The land was divided up in land use, fresh drinking water, and where humans can live. The students also had a small research project about the Santa Clara watershed there were 5 subjects that students researched. The subjects were invasive Arundo, macroinvertebrates, water quality, surface runoff, and endangered species Bell’s Viero. They were then to create posters for their subject and present that to the class.
Here are some of the posters from Channel Islands High School
Semester Research Recap
This semester I went to Santa Rosa Island 5 times to conduct research.
Recap of the weekends:
The first weekend we found all the site where we were going to survey at and what in particular we wanted to focus on.
The following four trips the stream team went out into water canyon and did multiple cross sections every weekend. Up until now, there is a total of 15 cross sections.
Collecting this data came with many challenges. As with all field research small problems came up. Luckily, there hasn’t been an issue that has been too big to solve. The biggest challenge that I have faced in my research so far is identifying unfamiliar plant species. When the plant is easy to take a picture of with clear details, is still living, or has flowering parts, the process of identifying it later is much easier. Not only have I spent hours in the field identifying plants, but I have spent numerous hours indoors looking up different plant species to correctly identify plants that are in my cross sections. Grasses have become my nightmare in the field the last five trips. I plan to master identifying grasses before going out into the field in January. Hopefully, this will minimize the number of hours looking up plant species after the fieldwork is completed.
I still have more fieldwork I plan to collect over winter break and next semester. In January, I will be on the island for two weeks straight. This large amount of time will allow me to complete my terrace data (the transects that contain all my grasses), finish the cross sections we had planned out, and add in any new cross sections to complete my data set. I will also be able to run sediment analysis on the areas that I am surveying to complete that aspect of my research. Next semester, I hope to have the majority of my research done so I will be able to focus my time on data analysis and writing my paper. I will take trips periodically if the data set is not complete or if there is any severe environmental changes, such as heavy rain storms due to the El Nino.
Week 13 Readings
Happy Friday!
This week we had two readings from Sternheimer as well as animated lectures from Annie Leonard.
The first Sternheimer chapter this week focused on consumption and materialism, topics that tie in very well with Leonards lectures. I found it interesting that Sternheimer (2013) wrote that “Children continue to be the focus of our fears of hyperconsumption, especially when it appears that children’s consumer knowledge is greater than that of their parents” (p. 247). She subverts this idea by questioning the spending of parents and asking if it is because of their brand name consciousness that makes their children aware of consumerism and brands. I also found it interesting that companies see success based on brand awareness and market shares rather than actual sales (p.260). This definitely has made me question a lot of the ads I’ve seen recently since I now know they are not necessarily after my wallet but after my brain. In this section, Sternheimer also mentioned how companies/brands “…target fashion-forward young people and bloggers who they think will influence their peers” (p. 259). This immediately made me think of YouTube, especially the beauty “guru” community. YouTube recently instated a rule saying that if someone is promoting a product in their video it must clearly be labeled as an ad in the title. However, it is still apparent that companies are paying attention to different creators demographics by the products they are basically advertising or giving away in their video (i.e. curling irons, makeup palettes, stylish water bottles). A few pages later, Sternheimer mentions a teacher who placed ads on their tests in order to have money for more supplies to make tests (p. 263). This instantly made me think of the ad creep advertising strategy we discussed in class!
Anyways, this chapter went along very nicely with Leonard’s lectures. Her focus was mainly on what problems are created by our consumerist society and that we need to work as a society to consume less and place less value on consumption. I actually watched “The Story of Stuff” (Leonard, 2007) in a class last semester, but was not aware of the follow up “The Story of Solutions”(Leonard, 2013). I agreed with many of the points she made in the solutions video, like that we should focus on better rather than more and that we should be internalizing costs. However, I think some of her ideas were a little unrealistic. While I wish people were willing to come together as a community to change the world, that’s just not the kind of world we live in. I think if there was a way that an individual could make more impact acting alone, then her ideas would be a little more realistic. I definitely, definitely agree with her idea of sharing in the solutions film. Hand me downs, thrift stores, libraries, eBay etc. are all great alternatives (and sometimes less costly) than going out and buying new books and clothes. Plus, you never know what odd clothing piece you’ll find at the Salvation Army (I’m thinking some totally outrageous 80s and 90s windbreakers…). I do find the results of our consumerism uncomforting and they make for a very bleak future, but I think the solution(s) need to be more accommodating to the types of people that are able to make changes. What did you think? Is Leonard asking for something nearly impossible or is are her goals realistic?
The last thing I want to discuss is the final Sternheimer chapter. This section was a very nice summary of the points the author has made in nearly every chapter; focusing on poverty, inequality, and placing unfair blame on the media. I liked that she summarized the way the media places blame and what the reality is (i.e. violence due to living in violent communities, not playing video games; limited sex ed is the cause of teen pregnancy rates, not reality television shows on the topic) (p. 278-279). Sternheimer also discussed lessons we can learn from pop culture, such as looking at the way issues like violence, racism, and homophobia are represented (p. 284). This was nicely tied back to media literacy and that we should focus on how and why things are produced, analyzing the media rather than fearing it (p. 284). To me, this is media literacy at its most basic: taking something we fear and learning to look critically at it rather than turn away from it. Did you have any thoughts on the final chapter?
Children and Materialism
Reading the chapters by Sternheimer I realized what a brat I might have been to my parents. Wanting things because my friends had them and getting that thing and realizing that I don’t really use it as much as I thought. I agree when she stated that “Public schools are going to continue to feel pressure to take corporate money”(263) This is a big deal because schools aren’t receiving the amount money from state and local governments so these corporations come in and give them funding to put up some poster. Sternheimer also talks about these corporations are not trying to give the school money because they care about the children’s future but because they “see the children as consumers who will buy the product if it is there to buy”(263). To think of children as consumers sounds crazy but when the same video games come out every year with a minor change and on the commercial it says “5/5 on graphics, best game yet” these kids just see that and want it now, IPhone is another example, slight change and everyone needs to have it. Channel One when pitched sounds like a great way to connect to other people and schools but when you look into the meat of it these kids are, at school, and are being forced to watch advertisements in between the learning and “the schools are being given a 50 thousand dollar bonus for having the program”(262).
I have read The Story of Stuff at my junior college in a political science class and learning how we are treating the earth is a hard thing to take down and watching the video brought it all back. “the U.S. has 5% percent of the world’s population but we use 35% of the world’s resources.” This is a very bad bit of data and the United States is a super power but how powerful can we be when we contain other countries resources to provide ourselves with more stuff we don’t need. The video also mentioned that “now that we have taken up all our countries resources we have to mosey on to the next and clean them out now.” Going to the third world and chopping down trees and mining for metals jus to keep our economy strong when it is really making us worse off. This movie makes feline there is no hope for us because people need to come together as a society to make a change but that is unlikely to happen unless we change our whole way of living. Lets go next generation!
Scott Lang
