Wildlife Foxton Trust has partnered with The NZ Marine Studies Centre at The University of Otago to assist in in their Marine Metre Squared (MM2) project for river bank and sea shore research programmes for schools.
The science learning area in the NZ curriculum promotes the idea of developing citizenship capabilities. Students (citizens) need to be ready, willing and able to use their science knowledge. Five basic capabilities that could contribute to a functional knowledge of science have been identified from Nature of Science (NOS) research.
Students participating in the Marine Metre Squared project all have the opportunity to experience all five of the Science capabilities to varying degrees based on their year level.
The Marine Metre Squared is a new nationwide citizen science project that supports and involves communities in the monitoring of their local seashore .
The project has been designed to provide meaningful, valid environmental baseline data on the state of seashores around New Zealand. It will enable us to not only take a snapshot of seashore biodiversity, but to form a baseline against which future change may be measured.
The aims of the Marine Metre Squared project are for participants to:
- learn more about the animals and plants that live between the tides around New Zealand
- collect valuable scientific information that will help build a picture of the biodiversity, distribution and abundance of seashore animals and plants in New Zealand’s marine environment
- monitor change in this habitat over time and investigate what might be causing the change
- make connections between scientists, educators, schools and community/Iwi groups who care about their local seashore environment and want to look after it.
If you would be interested in assisting, click the link here
You can find Marine Metre Squared on Social Media at the following links:
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