Learning About & Combating Marine Debris
Marine debris is human-made waste or litter that’s made it’s way into the ocean. It is causing harmful impacts on the ocean ecosystem world-wide, harming birds, fish, and mammals.
While many of these resources below are intended for classroom use, many are also great to use at nature journaling meet-ups to get the conversation started about marine debris. Us adults have a lot to learn too!
Lesson Plans and Learning Resources
Sustainable Coastline Resources Hub includes activities, book and movie recommendations, and links to articles and reports about marine debris. It also has a “Staff Favorites” section to help get you started! https://www.sustainablecoastlineshawaii.org/hub
Kokua Hawaii Foundation has lesson plans for marine debris sorting, art projects, and more: https://kokuahawaiifoundation.org/our-resources/#plastic-free-hawai%ca%bbi
Malama Learning Center created a poster about marine debris and a series of fun informative videos: https://www.malamalearningcenter.org/marine-debris.html
The Wayfinder Society is based in California, but they provide free, editable, hands-on environmental education lesson plans. They cover human impacts on the environment through the lenses of science, ELA, and the social sciences. Bonus: they also link their lesson plans to NGSS standards. https://algalita.org/wayfinder-society/lessons/ You can also check out their educational video library: https://algalita.org/wayfinder-society/videos/
Hawaii Wildlife Fund created a simple K-5 curriculum, with videos, handouts, and hands-on activities: https://www.wildhawaii.org/our-work/education/keiki-education/marine-debris-keiki-education-and-outreach/
UH Manoa created this science teaching method called, Sea-Earth-Atmosphere (SEA), based on the NOAA SEA Curriculum. Here’s one of the lesson plans related to marine debris: https://www.soest.hawaii.edu/uhsgpi/sealearning/grade-5/earth-and-space-science-3/marine-debris-2/ (Find more here: https://seagrant.soest.hawaii.edu/marine-debris/)
NOAA also provides an educational resource for learning about marine debris: https://marinedebris.noaa.gov/discover-marine-debris
Help With Research: Community Science
https://debristracker.org: Debris Tracker is designed to help citizen scientists like you make a difference by contributing data on plastic pollution in your community.
Clean Up Our Coastlines
Join Sustainable Coastlines for a cleanup or learning event: https://www.sustainablecoastlineshawaii.org/schedule
Surfrider Oahu also hosts cleanup events and advocates for better laws and regulations around marine debris: https://oahu.surfrider.org/cleanups
808 Cleanups have events all over the islands — help keep trash from local sources from ever entering the ocean! https://808cleanups.org/calendar/
More Learning Resources
Videos and information about the Great Pacific Garbage Patch: https://theoceancleanup.com/great-pacific-garbage-patch/
Parley Ocean Plastic: https://parley.tv/oceanplastic
Fascinating podcast from NPR about the floating organisms called neuston who, live in the floating garbage patches in the ocean: https://www.npr.org/transcripts/1255667287
A podcast from Science and the Sea about plastic on the ocean floor: https://scienceandthesea.org/program/plastic-floor
