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Week of April 21, 2025 | All Grades | Celebrating Earth Week

Earth Day is an annual observance, held on April 22, to increase awareness of environmental issues. Millions of people worldwide gather to clean up litter, to protest threats to the environment, and to celebrate progress in reducing pollution. In 1969, U.S. Senator Gaylord Nelson suggested that a day of environmental education be held on college campuses. The following year, the lawyer and environmentalist Denis Hayes (then a recent graduate of Stanford University) led hundreds of students in organizing the observance of Earth Day on April 22, 1970. About 20 million people participated in this celebration. The event helped to alert people to the dangers of pollution and fostered a new environmental movement. Also in 1970, Congress created the Environmental Protection Agency to set and enforce pollution standards, and passed the Clean Air Act which limits the amount of air pollution that cars, utilities, and industries could release. Other environmental laws soon followed. (Hayes, Denis. "Earth Day." World Book Student. World Book, 2016. Web. 18 Apr. 2016.)
The effort continues with Grades of Green, a grassroots organization that teaches kids about environmental stewardship that got its start at Grand View Elementary School in 2009. 

MBUSD Website Green District information page

Video ABC7 Eyewitness News Manhattan Beach Students are Pros at Saving the Planet ​

Week of April 21, 2025 | TK and Kindergarten | Earth Week
​Natural Resources

Video Define the environment as what is all around us. Talk about trees, water, fuel, and electricity. Define and discuss natural resources: paper, metal, glass, oil. The animated Think Earth shows the impact humans have on the environment and how to minimize impact for a healthier planet.

The Earth Book, by Todd Parr
Students learn simple ways to take care of the planet. 
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​Coloring sheets
Composting... Life in the Slow Lane! 
Clean Storm Drains = Healthy Oceans!

Week of April 21, 2025 | First Grade | Earth Week
Reduce, Reuse, Recycle, Rot, Repurpose, and Refuse

Video Recycle Rex Rex and friends learn about recycling firsthand when the field where they play is in jeopardy of being turned into a landfill. Define and discuss the Six Rs and how excessive packaging contributes to waste. 
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Coloring sheets
Composting... Life in the Slow Lane! 
Clean Storm Drains = Healthy Oceans!

Week of April 21, 2025 | Second Grade | Earth Week
Out of Sight, Out of Mind. Where Does Trash Go?

Clean Your Room, Harvey Moon! by Pat Cummings When Harvey cleans his room by stuffing everything under the rug he learns that though out of sight may be out of mind, it is not good enough when it comes to finding a place for his things. Discuss over-consumption and how landfills are filling to capacity. Talk about the importance of a clean beach.

Video clip Toys All Gone 
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Coloring sheets
Composting... Life in the Slow Lane! 
Clean Storm Drains = Healthy Oceans

Week of April 21, 2025 | Third Grade | Earth Week
Wetlands | Making Land Use Decisions for the Seventh Generation

Curriculum Connection Ballona Wetlands field trip.

Video Common Ground, the Water, Earth, and Air We Share Curriculum connection Opening with a visit to a wetlands preserve, the video imparts the message of conservation and responsibility for our shared natural resources and respect for the environment. The narrator references "The Seventh Generation" principle, an Haudenosaunee (Iroquois) philosophy: decisions we make today should result in a sustainable world seven generations into the future. If video is no longer available, read the book.​

Coloring sheets
Composting... Life in the Slow Lane! 
Clean Storm Drains = Healthy Oceans!

Week of April 21, 2025 | Fourth Grade | Earth Week
Hazardous Waste Disposal

Someday a Tree, by Eve Bunting
​A young girl, her parents, and their neighbors try to save an oak tree that has been poisoned by illegal hazardous waste dumping.

Video Big Yellow Taxi sung by Joni Mitchell

Coloring sheets
Composting... Life in the Slow Lane! 
Clean Storm Drains = Healthy Oceans!

Week of April 21, 2025 | Fifth Grade | Earth Week | Taking Action

Video Community commemorates the 1969 Santa Barbara oil spill
In 1969, Santa Barbara woke up to its coast coated in sticky, pungent oil. What came next changed environmental policy for the nation.

Black Beach: A Community, an Oil Spill, and the Origin of Earth Day, by Shaunna and John Stith
In 1969, Union Oil caused a hazardous oil spill off the coast of Santa Barbara that flooded the Pacific Ocean, harmed wildlife, and devastated habitats. But from this ecological disaster sprang a new wave of environmental activism that would change the world.

Website Pop History Dig has an extensive report with many archival photographs about the disaster and its effects on the growing ecology movement.

Coloring sheets
Composting... Life in the Slow Lane! 
Clean Storm Drains = Healthy Oceans!