Join Ocean Portal Editor-in-Chief Emily Frost and museum educators from the National Museum of Natural History as they guide you through the Ocean Portal website, exploring a multitude of digital assets including vetted scientific information, interactive content, and education resources.

This lesson plan develops concepts on food webs and ecological relationships, giving special attention to microorganisms and Chesapeake Bay species and dynamics. Students will conduct investigations, generate their own data and find out more about species they constantly see!

This activity is meant to provide students with an understanding of how microbes play a role in the climate system, from the formation of the atmosphere to current climate dynamics to the role of microbes in climate change. This activity can be done within a unit on microbes, microbial oceanography or as a stand-alone activity connected to climate change. The activity is meant to be completed in one class period (60-minute minimum) but could be extended.

For most of us, the term “marine organism” brings to mind images of fishes, coral reefs, marine mammals, or other animals that are easy to see with the naked eye. Yet, 98% of the biomass in Earth’s ocean and most of its biological activity is provided by marine microbes— organisms that are exceedingly small, less than a few thousandths of a millimeter. Scientists conducted a global survey of marine microbes species in 2014 called Ocean Sampling Day. This lesson plan includes a marine microbe activity and a simulation of the activities conducted in the 2014 survey.

Food webs demonstrate complex feeding relationships among species in an ecosystem by combining several food chains. Scientists use food webs to demonstrate the fragile and interconnected nature of an ecosystem. This activity demonstrated the complexity of a food web and what can happen when one component of a food web is altered.

Along the East Coast of the United States, two diseases can cause significant damage to growing oysters and in some cases even kill them. In this lesson plan, students will use data to determine whether water temperature, oyster size, or time of planting determines whether a young oyster becomes ill with disease.  

The veined rapa whelk is an invader in Chesapeake waters. These predatory snails eat ecologically and economically important shellfish that are native to the bay. In this lesson, students will learn about invasive species and predict where the invasive rapa whelk will live within the bay. A discussion of invasive species impacts on native ecosystems will follow. 

Hurricanes are powerful storms that can cause devastating damage when they hit the shore. How is it that these storms grow to such impressive sizes? This lesson plan teaches students about how hurricanes form and then probes students to think about how changing conditions are affecting hurricane patterns.

An observer on the seashore may make the mistake of thinking that all ocean water is the same. But the ocean is actually composed of several layers of water with specific properties—temperature and salinity being the main drivers of layering. Students will see how these two properties affect layering in the ocean.

Coastal erosion is a natural process that sweeps large sections of land out to sea. Students will learn about how this process occurs and then explain how human activity can increase erosion risk. They will then determine how to reduce these risks, understanding both the advantages and disadvantages of various options. Students will also look a beach elevation data and make predictions on how vulnerable they are to erosion.