Berkeley students receive a hands-on lesson in ecosystems

BLOOMFIELD, NJ — Berkeley Elementary School fifth-graders were treated to a visit on Friday, Nov. 3, from the senior naturalist of the Essex County Park System.

The naturalist, David Alexander, came with objects and photographs to illuminate local ecosystems and set up four discovery stations for the students to explore. Sitting on the classroom floor, the children excitedly called out answers to his questions about the specimens, but Alexander kept order by asking that hands be raised.

“It gives a chance to think about the answer when you don’t call out,” he said.
One discovery station had furs and shells; another had plaster models of animal tracks; there were skulls at a third; and at the fourth, photographs of animals to be matched with photographs of their droppings.

Alexander held up two shells, explaining the difference between a box turtle, which lives on land, and the snapping turtle, a freshwater denizen.
He said the state ecosystems supported more than 3,000 bears, and when he displayed a photograph of bear droppings, or scat, and said the picture was a scratch and sniff card, he had students chuckling,

“What I get excited about is how diverse our ecosystem is in Essex County and the state,” he said.
The children were divided into four groups which then went from station to station.

But what exactly is an ecosystem? Alexander asked. He provided them with a simple definition: A place where living and nonliving things interact.
It was then time to play a game and everyone returned to the floor and sat in one large circle. Alexander joined them on the rim. Around everyone’s neck was a photograph of something living or nonliving within an ecosystem. Alexander had a picture of a rabbit around his neck. He also held a ball of yarn and asked the children to what might a rabbit connect in our ecosystem? He looked around and decided that the rabbit ate some grass. He then rolled the yarn ball to the student representing grass. This student said she needed water and then rolled the ball to the water/student. Back and forth the ball rolled as the living and nonliving connected.

“Black bears love blueberries,” Alexander called out and the ball was rolled from the black bear into the blueberry patch. “Energy is being passed in the food chain. In nature, you’re either predator or prey. Oh! Don’t roll the ball to the person next to you!”

Finally, everything in the system was connected and the children were holding onto the circumference of a web.
“Just give it a light tug to see how connected we are,” Alexander said.
The web tightened.

“Everything in the ecosystem tugs and pulls on everything,” he said.
Now, what would happen if disaster struck? he asked. Suppose it was a flood?
“If you are the soil or a small animal, let go,” Alexander said.
What would a fire do to an ecosystem? The trees and bushes let go. What about drought?
“Fish can let go,” he said.

Extinction and over hunting? Bears, deer and other wildlife, they let go
Finally, most connections lay on the floor.

“Check it out, guys,” Alexander said. “We had a happy ecosystem but it started to collapse.”
He began to roll the tangled yarn back into a ball. This was not an easy thing to do. He asked the children what they could do to be stewards of the environment. They answered: stop littering; do not waste water or food; and if you can, shun the car and walk instead, which could lessen pollution.

Alexander asked them to make small changes in their lives to help preserve the Essex County ecosystem. He said he once asked a class, if planet Earth could speak, what would it say to you? A first-grader responded by saying, “You take care of me and I’ll take care of you.”
Alexander said that was as good an answer as you’ll get.

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