Education

In 1996, the WCCD began its Education Program with grant funding from the Wyoming Department of Agriculture using matching mill levy funds. This program has grown steadily each year. The goal of the Natural Resource Education Program is:

-To provide quality education/information to Washakie County residents that promotes a knowledge and appreciation of the conservation of natural resources, and of our local resource base, by utilizing a "hands-on" and interactive leaning approach.

WCCD is pleased to be the home of a set of Natural Resource Discovery Tool Chests provided by Wyoming Ag in Classroom. The Discovery Tool Chests contain a great amount of knowledge and understanding on agriculture and natural resources. Each chest is filled with interdisciplinary and scientifically-accurate educational materials such as rubber animal tracks, water quality testing kits, age-appropriate lesson plans, posters, videos, CD’s and hands-on field books. All the materials in the Natural Resource Discovery Tool Chest are high-quality, place-based activities that integrate Science, Math, Social Studies, Art, English and Geography.

For more information on the contents of the Tool Chests please check out the Wyoming Ag in the Classroom website at: http://www.wyoagcenter.com/waic/classroom.html

WCCD's 2007 Grand Prize Poster Contest Winner for 2nd Grade

WCCD's 2007 Grand Prize Poster Contest Winner for 5th Grade

The Soil and Water Stewardship Week's these in 2007 was "Today is the Day to be a part of Conservation's Power". Presentation were made to each 2nd and 5th grade class in Washakie County and the students participated in the annual poster contest. Presentations focused on the importance of alternative energy sources. Over 180 posters were submitted and the winning posters were on display in downtown Worland during Stewardship Week.

The Washakie County Conservation District (WCCD) continues to assist Washakie County schools in their efforts to recycle by replacing classroom recycling bins. In 2002, the WCCD first purchased classroom recycling bins for all of Washakie County schools. With new schools, with additional classrooms, and the wear and tear on the bins over time, the WCCD decided to once again purchase bins to ensure that there were enough recycling bins for everyone. In most of Washakie County's schools, there are classes or groups of students that are responsible for emptying the bins.

The Washakie County Conservation District (WCCD) assisted Worland fourth graders with their studies of landfills and recycling with a trip to the local landfill and recycling center, where they learned the principals of proper recycling and waste disposal. The classroom follow up, to the field trip, included learning the process of paper recycling from shreds, to pulp, to screening and drying.

The District assisted Southside Elementary teachers with their studies of the rocks and the rock cycle with a filed trip of the local geology. Fifth and third grade classes took part in learning about rock formations dating back millions of years, to the present. Students collected examples if igneous, sedimentary, and metamorphic rock, in addition to fish scale fossils.

Students from 5th through 8th grade joined forces this past spring in planting seedling trees at their Outdoor Classroom on the Lyman Ranch in Ten Sleep. The students planted over 100 tree and shrub seedlings and conducted water quality monitoring on the ponds.

A day in the Big Horn Mountains at the Nature Conservancy’s Tensleep Preserve is a great way to learn about trees; from life cycles and identification, to fire’s role in the forest. That is just what third grade students did with the help of the District’s Education Specialist and Worland BLM’s fire crew.

After a field trip to the Ten Sleep Fish Hatchery and a look at Ten Sleep Creek’s aquatic insects, two classes of fourth grade students learned about fish life cycles by playing “Hooks and Ladders”, a game that simulates the migration and life cycle of Pacific Salmon.

Geo-caching was a great way to burn off the springtime energy and learn about the use of GPS technology for 115 eighth grade students. The students learned to enter GPS points to navigate a geo-caching course at the Moonrock Equestrian Center. Personnel from NRCS, BLM, and the District assisted the teachers with this activity.

Damselflies and Dragonflies are two of Southside school second graders favorite insects. They study them in the fall with numerous related activities in all the core curriculum areas.

Although they were stormed out of a field trip to the mountains, that didn’t stop the 2nd graders from Southside school from taking a field trip to a local park to learn how to snow shoe and cross-country ski, which was an extension from their science unit on animal adaptations.

The District’s Outdoor Classroom, which is located approximately 3 miles south of Worland, is utilized for a wide variety of natural resource/agriculture education. The property is leased to the District by the landowner for the purpose of providing our area youth with a place to study natural resource topics.

At the Outdoor Classroom, activities have included:

The Study of Plants.............................

There are seventeen varieties of grasses, thirteen varieties of shrubs and trees, and of course, there are a few weed species that blow in and make their presence known. All of this variety gives us the opportunity for studying plants from roots to seeds. Studies have included leaf shapes, seed dispersal types, plant identification, plant classification, tree planting, sunflower planting, and more.

In 2005, the WCCD added a new addition to the Outdoor Classroom; a Xeriscape demonstration plot. Thanks to a grant from the USDA Bighorn Forest, the WCCD partnered with the Worland High School Horticulture class and the Chief Washakie FFA to develop and install the plot. Students from the Horticulture class use the site as a hands-on project to learn about Xeric plants, landscape design principles, soil properties and testing, and installing a drip irrigation system. In addition, the students have started as many of the plants as possible in the Worland High School's greenhouse. The FFA chapter assisted with the project by using the chapter's tractor and implements to do the soil preparation.

The Study of Water........................

The Outdoor Classroom has a wetland development that, over the years, has been a wonderful place to study about water properties, water conservation and water as a habitat. We have incorporated Outdoor Classroom activities with school room studies and the presentation of the Enviroscape® and Groundwater Flow models for third grade students who learn about the water cycle.

The "pond" can also be an excellent place to learn about amphibians such as frogs, toads, and salamanders, as well as a host of aquatic insects. tadpoles are the critter of choice every few years when the pond is alive with them. Boys and Girls Club members have captured tadpoles then watched their dramatic change into frogs in an aquarium at the center. When the change is complete, they have a release day, back at the Outdoor Classroom. Many a net full of insects have been hoisted out of the pond to be viewed by elementary students of all grades. Students learn about dragonfly and damselfly nymphs, beetles and beetle larvae, mosquito and fly larvae, water striders, backswimmers and others. No matter how much time they have, it seems they always want more time to observe these fascinating creatures of the aquatic world.

Advanced Biology Class Setting Up Width, Depth & Velocity Measurements.

Advanced Biology Students Looking At Macroinvertebrates

At the Middle School level, the WCCD has assisted the 6th grade classes each year in the National Day of Water Quality Monitoring since 2002. All of the 6th grade students from Worland Middle School each year, monitor pH, dissolved oxygen, temperature, turbidity, and take photos at 8 different sites in the Worland area during the course of the day. The information collected is then added to the National Day of Monitoring website's database.

The Advanced Biology class at Worland High School has also taken on an ambitious water quality monitoring curriculum study in the fall of each year. Four streams located in differing riparian conditions are monitored each year. The students study chemical, physical and biological aspects of the streams. The chemical properties included tests for pH, Nitrates, and Ortho-phosphates. The physical properties include temperature, dissolved oxygen, turbidity, discharge, width to depth measurements, substrate materials, and a map of the site’s riparian area. The biological aspect includes a look at the aquatic insect population and the students note the types of fish present. After all the information is collected on each site the students working in groups, analyze the data and write reports for each of the sites.

The Conservation District assists the Worland High School teachers each year with the use of the Wyoming Game and Fish’s “Stream Trailer”, the trailer is a self contained watershed model complete with running water. It is used to teach basic hydrology and stream morphology principals, and make the learning hands-on and fun. In the plastic sand, students’ set-up varying watershed features (i.e. meandering or steep straight channels or channels with bridges or culverts), speculate what will happen in the watershed, and then turn on the water to see how their watershed functions. District personnel deliver the trailer to WHS and help with the first few days of classes.

For the past 7 years WCCD has helped the WHS Advanced Biology class in its effort to study one of nature’s most elusive creatures, Bats. With funding from a Wyoming Game and Fish Project Wild grant and a Wyoming Community Foundation’s Governors’ Youth Initiative grant WCCD was able to purchase two different types of echolocation equipment for the Advanced Biology Students to monitor bat activity.

Each year the new group of students studies the past data collected and carry out additional research before coming up with a new hypothesis for the year. They then set up their own monitoring plan and schedule, designed to try to prove their hypothesis. The monitoring includes the use of “mini” bat echo locators which indicate presence/absence and the use of the Anabat ® echolocation system which electronically records the bats echolocation calls and reproduces them in a graph format. This format can then be used to identify the species of bats present as each species has a unique signature of frequency and cadence of their calls. The students have a six week monitoring schedule and at the end of that time frame they must compile their data and write a report. The project is intended to teach the process of carrying out a wildlife study and this hands-on learning experience comes complete with all the additions that “mother nature” throws at professional researchers.

As part of the bat study WCCD and the Nature Conservancy’s Ten Sleep Preserve provide an optional field trip weekend to the Preserve to capture bats with mist nets. Wyoming Game and Fish Non-Game Mammal Biologist Martin Grenier attends as the “bat handler” for the weekend. The students do all the work setting up and taking down the nets and Mr. Grenier takes the bats out of the net once caught and has the students help him weigh, identify the sex of the bat, and take body measurements before releasing the bat. Students that had once thought of bats as “mice with wings” now have a new appreciation for this flying mammal.