PreK-8 Environmental Education Activity Guide

Bring the environment into your classroom and still meet today’s standards!

New PreK-8 Activity Guide The new PreK-8 Guide improves upon the proven effectiveness of the former guide. We have added the following components to the new guide: Reading Connections listed at the end of each activity Technology Connections in most activities Differentiating Instruction enhancements Two new activities: "The Global Climate" and "Invasive Species"

The PreK-8 Guide also has a fresh new look, a new activity layout, a revised Introduction that features the educational foundations of PLT and describes several new components of the guide, and revised and added Appendices and Indices that are more user-friendly and reflect the major changes to the guide.

PreK-8 Guide Resources (Includes Student Pages!)

Search by activity to locate supporting resources for each activity in the PreK-8 Guide. Resources include printable student pages, technology connections, stories, charts, illustrations, and more.

Children's Literature List - sorted by author or by PLT activity

Correlation Chart for PreK-8 Activities and PLT Conceptual Framework Concepts

View Sample Activities

Activity 20: Environmental Exchange Box 
     (Sign up here to become an Environmental Exchange Box Partner)

Activity 51: Make Your Own Paper 

About the PreK-8 Guide

Charting Diversity. Birds and Worms. Pollution Search. These are some of the 96 hands-on interdisciplinary activities in PLT's PreK-8 guide. The PreK-8 Guide covers such topics as water and air quality, ecology, urban environments, and recycling. See the Topic Index from the PreK-8 Guide for a complete listing of activities that address various topics.

Education Connections
The guide is designed to meet the common components of national education reform by using the constructivist approach to learning, whole language teaching, cooperative learning, problem solving, and authentic assessments.

In many states, the PreK-8 Guide and the secondary modules have been correlated to state learning standards. At the national level, the curriculum has been correlated to the National Science Standards, National Social Studies Standards, Excellence in EE Guidelines, and Girl Scout (badge) program activities.

Before making the guide widely available, PLT commissioned a formal evaluation. The results confirmed that PLT is effective in helping students become more environmentally literate citizens.

What's Inside the Guide
The activities are organized into five main themes:  diversity, interrelationships, systems, structure and scale, and patterns of change.

The guide is designed so you can use a single activity or many over the course of a quarter or school year. Each activity includes an overview, background content, a teachers' step-by-step guide, and provides:

• Grade level recommendations
• Incorporating subjects, such as math or language arts
• Concepts, skills, and curriculum objectives
• Needed materials, many of which are easy to obtain, free or low-cost
• A timeline - how long it will take to prepare and conduct the activity
• Related Activities
• Assessment opportunities for students
• Reproducible student pages (for most activities) that are also available in Spanish (for editions prior to 2006)

Want to Reprint PLT Activities?

All PLT curriculum materials are protected under copyright laws.  No reproduction of PLT materials without prior written consent is allowed.  All requests for permission to reprint must be submitted to the national PLT office.  Please click here to see more reprint guidelines.