Grade Level:
6-8
Lesson Plan 1:
Subject Areas:
Science, Social Studies
An Archipelago of Islands – New York City, a Harbor Estuary
Duration:
One 45min class period with
added homework activity
Setting:
Classroom/Outdoors
Skills:
Mapping, interpreting, reading
and comprehension, and
communication of science
Correlation with NY Core
Curriculum Standards:
Process skills based on Standard
4: Physical Setting skills
***
(Adapted with permission from Project Ports (http://njaes.rutgers.edu/spotlight/project-ports2011.asp)
Charting the Course:
In this lesson students will to become familiar with the geography of New York
City and surrounding areas. By working with a map of their local area students
will first gain their sense of place within the region by locating their school,
home and oyster garden in relation to the geography of New York City and its
surrounding waterways. The students will then learn about why Estuaries
form, what is an Estuary, what is a Watershed, and what do Estuaries and
brackish waters mean for living organisms and biodiversity.
SWBAT:
 Orient themselves on a map of their home city.
 Identify the different water bodies surrounding their city comprising
the larger Hudson Raritan Estuary.
 Identify and Create different aspects of a map (e.g. compass, legend).
 Estimate the location of NY Harbor’s estuaries and watershed.
New Vocabulary :
Archipelago: a group of islands
Peninsula: a piece of land that is
surrounded on only 3 sides by
water
Watershed: an area of land in
which all water drains to a
common outlet
Ecosystem: a biological
community of interacting
organisms and their environment
Background for teacher:
An alternative way to view the city is to realize that New York City is built on
an archipelago of islands; Staten Island, the Isle of Manhattan, and Long
Island (home to both Brooklyn and Queens). The only part of the city on the
continental U.S. is the Bronx, which in fact is on a peninsula. On all sides New
York City is surrounded by water; the Hudson River, Long Island Sound, East
River, Harlem River, Jamaica Bay, Arthur Kill and the Kill van Kull, and Upper
New York harbor. The water flowing into New York Harbor comes from two
sources; the Atlantic Ocean brings in salty water and the Hudson River with its
associated watershed brings in freshwater from the mountains. This mix of
fresh and salt water is called brackish water, making New York Harbor and its
waterways an estuary. Estuaries are among the most productive of Earth's
ecosystems and support a great diversity of life.
Estuary: transition zone of salt
and fresh water
Procedure
Brackish water: The mix of fresh
and salt water
***
25 Minutes: Activity 1 Mapping
Materials needed:
7 Minutes: Wrap-up
-student copies of map
-student set of hw reading
-pencils
-video
5 minutes: Explanation of Homework (reading comprehension
exercise) and Exit ticket.
8 Minutes: Warm-up
Warm Up
Open up with a class discussion. Ask the students what the first thing is that they imagine when they hear the
words; “New York City”…Skyscrapers? Central Park? Millions of people? Cars? What about islands and water?
Ask questions such as:


What is a watershed?
What is an estuary?
At this point, teachers should give a brief explanation that an estuary is the transition zone from salt water to
fresh water and that watersheds are an area of land in which all water drains to a common outlet. Teachers
may choose to use the following 1-minute video, which describes the nature and uses of watersheds:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f63pwrMXkV4
and also a similar 5-minute video on estuaries, their ecology and economic value:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XLumSN4G5P4
Activity 1: Mapping my Location
Students will be in groups based on their needs, pairing students that are struggling with those that are
excelling. Additional consideration will be given for students that are ELL or former ELL. These students
should be specifically paired with students that of proficient ELL status or approaching proficiency. Thus,
students will have the support they need from their classmates, creating an environment where not only are
lower level students being supported, but higher level students are practicing the communication of their
understanding to others, a key aspect and skill of science. Each group will have a regional map of New York
State that includes the Hudson Raritan Estuary/New York City Waterways, but no labels. There will also be
no map parameters, such as compass rose, title, legend, scale, etc. The teacher will have a larger map
displayed on the whiteboard that the class can follow. The teacher will introduce the larger Hudson Raritan
Estuary, its boundaries and water bodies, and their respective watersheds, describing what an estuary is, and
then focus on the New York City area (see introductory page for more details on HRE).
(This is an opportune time to introduce to the students that they will become restoration
scientists taking care of a small cage of oysters. Oysters live in estuarine waters therefore NYC
waters is an ideal habitat for oysters. Let’s see if we can find where our oysters are?)
For this activity, students will first label where they live, the location of their oyster garden (which they will
know having gone to the location already, or they will be informed where it is and have to correlate based on
their prior knowledge of New York geography), and their school on the map. Next, students will be given the
opportunity to access Google Earth in order to label all relevant bays and rivers. Next, students will add a
title, compass rose, legend and scale. These are essential for students to learn the skill of mapping. As
students label in their group maps, a representative will label the class map, thus jig-sawing the creation and
completion of the class map as a model for the entire class.
The mapping activity will be the first set of data that the students will collect for their Oyster Research folder.
They will be able to refer to this map for their final project write up.
Through a series of scavenger hunt questions students will be able to complete their map:
1-Map title: How can we title this map so that it describes our objective in creating a map such as this?
2-Which way is north, south, east, west (add small compass rose to map in top left corner)
3-Locate New York City, name and find all five boroughs and label them on your map
4-Scale (1inch = how many miles?) Students should estimate how many miles there are per inch, and then the
teacher will tell them the correct scale. The scale is dependent on how large the provided map is printed.
Identify and label all water bodies making up the HRE:
5-What is the city’s largest river? Hint: It flows on the west side of Manhattan (Hudson River)
6-What ocean does NY Harbor eventually flow into? (Atlantic Ocean)
7-Where is Upper and Lower New York Bay?
8-Name the river that flows on the east side of Manhattan (East River)
9-Name the waterway that divides the Bronx from Manhattan (Harlem River)
10-Where does the East River come from? (Long Island Sound)
11-What are the waters south of Queens and east of Brooklyn, with small landmasses in it? (Jamaica Bay)
12-What are the names of the water bodies that surround Staten Island?
(North - Kill van Kull, West – Arthur Kill, East – NY Harbor, South – Raritan Bay)
13- Where is the mixing zone of fresh water and salt water? Please label this on your map with arrows and
denote is as an Estuary.
14- Put a circle around where you believe all the freshwater comes from. Denote this as the NY watershed.
Localized questions:
13-Where is our school located? What is our closest water body?
14-Where is our oyster garden? Is it far from school?
15-Where do you live? (This can be a homework question that students can ask parents to help with).
Extension of Activity:
Students can indicate on map where famous landmarks are for example: The Statue of Liberty, Governor’s
Island, Central Park, Prospect Park, Flushing Meadows Park, Empire State Building, Freedom Tower,
Brooklyn Bridge, Manhattan Bridge, Verrazano Bridge, and George Washington Bridge etc.
Wrap up
Ask the class what the most dominant natural feature in New York City is. Note that many people do not
automatically think about the sea when they think of the city. Discuss with the class why that is, why is there
this disconnect? As New York City began to grow in size over the last 300 years many factories were built
along the waterfront limiting public access to the water. These factories were ideally located so they could
discharge their pollution directly into NYC waterways. This pollution negatively affected water quality
causing many aquatic species to die and people stayed away from the water due to health concerns. In the
following oyster lesson plans water pollution and the effects will be discussed in more detail.
Exit Ticket:
Students will receive a third-sheet of paper that simply asks, what is an estuary, what is a watershed?
Students will receive 3 minutes to complete the Exit Ticket. They will be collected and assessed by the
teacher at the end of class and returned to students the following lesson.
Homework:
Students will receive the attached article, and complete a two-columned organizer. The left column contains
main ideas, vocabulary words, etc. and the right side defines these ideas and vocabulary words through
expansion and citation from the text.
Modifications
The reading comprehension can be given as homework as a prelude to the mapping exercise so that students
have a prior understanding of the Hudson River Watershed or as summative assessment after the lesson is
taught.
Assessment:
For this lesson, all three styles of assessment will be taken into consideration. First, and for this lesson most
importantly, there will be pre-assessment. At the beginning of the lesson, the teacher will begin introducing
terms such as density, estuary, brackish, etc. The teacher should be monitoring student response and
engagement and evaluate whether or not these are new terms for the students. Density, for instance, is a key
aspect of estuary structure, and if students do not come in with a solid understanding of how density works, a
lesson on density explicitly, may need to be taught before this lesson on estuaries commences. Second, there
will be formative assessment in the form of monitoring of student input and engagement throughout the
class. The teacher will walk around the groups during Activity 1 and guide students through their activity, if
needed, stop to address problematic areas to the class, identify key vocabulary words where necessary, and
more. Finally, there will be summative assessment, by analyzing the results of the Homework reading
assignment. Answers that reflect conceptual understanding from the class’s material will suffice. Those that
are direct reflections of the homework’s text will not suffice. In addition, the Exit Ticket will be used as
summative assessment as well.