Fifth grade curriculum is focused on the Open Ocean.Field Trips and Speakers
Jump to field trip listings.
Speakers and Assemblies — Open Ocean
Scan for your region in the activities below.
Ane Carla Rovetta
A storyteller, science illustrator, field biologist, and teacher of cultural uses of plants and nature crafts. Tells and dramatizes tales of ocean, plant, and animals in the "old" days.
Extraordinary assembly presentations last 45-60 minutes. Ane works with individual classes as well.
Contact Name: Ane Carla Rovetta
Phone: 707-762-5239
Fax: 707-762-4535
Region(s): California-Central, California-Northern, California-Southern, Monterey
Animania
Hand-on science gets cold, wet and salty with Animania's marine science program! This exciting program series features both an in-class presentaion and a tidepool experience at the touch tanks.
Phone: (858) 693-9200
Region(s): California-Southern
Banana Slug String Band
Environmental education through music, poetry, drama, and movement with hands-on science. Ask for the Slug's Marine Science Program. Based on the Slug's award winning Slugs at Sea and the MARE curriculum, this program focuses on the marine habitats of the West Coast. Favorite Slug's songs such as the Water Cycle Boogie are featured. All performances are developmentally appropriate for the age group. Family nights and special events are also available.
Contact Name: Doug Greenfield & Larry Graff
Phone: (831) 429-9806
Fax: (831) 475-5552
Contact Email: dougdirt@bananaslugstringband.com or airylarry@bananaslugstringband.com
Region(s): California-Central, California-Northern, California-Southern, Monterey
Bureau of Land Management Watershed Education
The Bureau of Land Management provides site field trips and classroom speakers. The educational focus is on the culture and history of the lands and overall sterwardship. Watershed education and botany are also topics of discussion.
Contact Name: Clara Sander
Phone: 707-825-2500
Contact Email: csandergander@hotmail.com
Region(s): California-Central, California-Northern
Claire the Loon Music
Ocean Commotion is a forty minute concert/sing-along for children K-6 performed by Alan Spector and Debra Knox. The theme of this assembly is appreciating aquatic environments and the living things found there. They sing about the pleasure one can derive from the water, swimming and enjoying the wonders of the sea. There is also the message that we can seriously damage the planet's ecosystems with pollution and overuse. The kids will sing, dance, and laugh at some of the silly parts of the show, but they will come away from the performance with respect for the Earth and its aquatic environments. Each school that books OCEAN COMMOTION will receive a CD of the songs from the show along with the complete lyrics!
Contact Name: Alan Spector, Director
Phone: (510) 558-8120
Contact Email: alan965@comcast.net
Region(s): California-Central, California-Northern
Environmental Educational Experiences
Jim Peckarsky will illustrate personal encounters with animals through slides and videos and will demonstrate the importance of keeping the world's ecosystems in balance.
K-12: A Fascinating Look into the World of Whales
3-12: Encounters with Marine Animals; Endangered Animals: What Can Be Done?; Baby Harp Seals; Common Loons; Swimming with the Manatee; Pollotion: Are there Solutions?; Galapagos; Animal Adaptations; Arthropods; Molluscs; Inner Workings of Plants; Worms; Bald Eagles; Timber Wolf; Mountain Lions.
60-90 minute assembly program or classroom presentation. Pre- and post-materials available on endangered animals, whales, pollution, and some general information.
Contact Name: Jim Peckarsky
Phone: (858) 273-0567
Region(s): California-Southern
Lawrence Hall of Science
The Lawrence Hall of Science Programs for Schools & Community Groups offer several programs for school sites and at the Hall. Assemblies: Dazzling science-on-stage presentations that involve your enthusiastic audience. Perfect for large groups. Workshops: Every student becomes a scientist, immersed in innovative, hands-on science and math activities. Choose from dozens of workshops for all grades in earth science, life science, math, computers, and physical science. Festivals: Involve the whole school community in science and math learning. Great for your open house or school fair. Science Discovery Theatre: Live performances that deliver important science and math concepts with fun, humor, songs, stories, and audience involvement. Multi-session Courses: Choose a course with the content you want as well as the dates, times, and number of sessions.
Phone: (510) 642-1700
Region(s): California-Central, California-Northern
Living Science Foundation
Want a touch tank for your school? The Living Science Foundation brings live animals to your school or classroom. With over 20 years of service and experience LSF has grown to be an organization nationally recognized as an innovator and a leader in science out-reach education. Over these many years they have helped to inspire and educate over 2 million children, one by one.
Contact Name: Tim Joslyn
Phone: (650) 726-1923
Fax: (650) 726-1994
Contact Email: timjoslyn@mac.com
Region(s): California-Central, California-Northern, Monterey
Madeleine Dunphy
Swim with the Sharks. Lurk with the Lions. Mingle with the Monkeys.
Award-winning children’s book author, Madeleine Dunphy, will guide your classes through some of the world’s most fascinating ecosystems, from the tropical rain forest to the arctic tundra. Her interactive presentations challenge, inform, and entertain. Best of all, they involve students in the web of life. Madeleine’s books have won awards from the National Science Teachers Association, Children’s Book Council, and the International Reading Association, among others. She is a curriculum designer with a Masters Degree in Education who has taught at the California Academy of Sciences, Lawrence Hall of Science and dozens of elementary schools. To research her books, Madeleine traveled as far as the Amazon rain forest, African savanna and Great Barrier Reef.
Contact Name: Madeleine Dunphy
Phone: (510) 428-1945
Contact Email: mdunphy@mdunphy.com
Region(s): California-Central, California-Northern, Monterey
Splash Van
A mobile science lab featuring five different stations where kids use computers, microscopes, chemistry experiments and living creatures to learn about water quality and insect life. The lab teaches students the connection between human activities and the health of the environment.
Phone: 858-694-7000
Region(s): California-Southern
Field Trips — Open Ocean
Scan for your region in the activities below.
Bay Area Discovery Museum
The museum conducts a variety of ocean-related field trips, and maintains interactive exhibits related to the bay and general Bay Area science and culture.
Phone: (415) 487-4398
Region(s): California-Central
Dolphin Charters
San Francisco Bay Area naturalist Ronn Storro-Patterson guides boat expeditions for school groups through wetland marshes in the delta, to watch gray whales off the coast, and to troll for fish and plankton in the bay.
Phone: (510) 527-9622
Region(s): California-Central, California-Northern
Exploratorium
This science exploration hall contains approximately 600 interactive science exhibits and several marine tanks that demonstrate processes and concepts from all areas of science. Exhibit "Explainers," individualized programs, and teacher training workshops are available.
Phone: (415) 563-7337
Region(s): California-Central, California-Northern
Floating Marine Lab
From October through June, San Diego County Schools offer a unique Floating Marine Lab program aboard the dive boats Horizon and Ocean Odyssey. For all age groups.
Contact Email: hmmail@hmlanding.com
Phone: (858) 277-7823
Region(s): California-Southern
Lawrence Hall of Science
The Lawrence Hall of Science Programs for Schools & Community Groups offer several programs for school sites and at the Hall. Assemblies: Dazzling science-on-stage presentations that involve your enthusiastic audience. Perfect for large groups. Workshops: Every student becomes a scientist, immersed in innovative, hands-on science and math activities. Choose from dozens of workshops for all grades in earth science, life science, math, computers, and physical science. Festivals: Involve the whole school community in science and math learning. Great for your open house or school fair. Science Discovery Theatre: Live performances that deliver important science and math concepts with fun, humor, songs, stories, and audience involvement. Multi-session Courses: Choose a course with the content you want as well as the dates, times, and number of sessions.
Phone: (510) 642-1700
Region(s): California-Central, California-Northern
Oakland Museum
The museum contains a nautral science hall that expores the varied ecosystems of California, including marine habitats. A variety of hands-on and interdisciplinary classes are available for grades K-12.
Phone: (510) 238-3818
Region(s): California-Central
Oceanic Society Expeditions
Oceanic Society Expeditions is a non-profit organization conducting educational and enjoyable natural history day cruises, nearly year-round, to experience the Bay Area's fascinating marine life: whales, dolphins, sea lions and sea birds. Expert naturalists lead all trips and explain the natural history of gray whales, and how they have recovered from near extinction. Trips leave from San Francisco, Half Moon Bay, and Bodega Bay. Voted best whale watch by San Francisco Bay Guardian.
Contact Name: Justin Barker
Phone: 415-474-3385
Fax: 415-474-3395
Region(s): California-Central
Pacific Environment and Resources Center (PERC)
The PERC education facility is on Rodeo Beach in the Marin Headlands. This ideal site allows student the opportunity to explore a sandy beach and trails through the Headlands and to see views of rocky seashore and the open ocean. As part of the same field trip, students can take part in other programs offered nearby at the Marine Mammal Center, the Headlands Instiutue, or the Marin Headlands Visitor Center. Call for reservations.
Contact Email: perc@igc.org
Phone: (415) 332-8200
Fax: (415) 332-8167
Region(s): California-Northern
Save the Bay Restoration Programs
Save The Bay’s Community-Based Restoration (CBR) Programs gives your class an opportunity to participate in hands-on restoration of San Francisco Bay habitats. While they're getting their hands dirty, students will learn about the ecology of wetland habitats, the role of native plants in a healthy ecosystem, and the current issues affecting the health of the Bay.
Save The Bay offers restoration programs at sites all around the Bay:
*Bair Island in Redwood City
*Eden Landing in Hayward
*Marin Islands National Wildlife Refuge and State Ecological Preserve
*Martin Luther King, Jr. Shoreline in Oakland
*San Francisquito Creek in Palo Alto
*Santa Venetia Marsh in San Rafael
*Schoolhouse Creek in Berkeley
*Tolay Creek in Sonoma
Contact Name: Alicia Moore
Contact Email: amoore@saveSFbay.org
Phone: (510) 452-9261
Fax: (510) 452-9266
Region(s): California-Central, California-Northern
Steinhart Aquarium (California Academy of Sciences)
The Steinhart, which opened in September 1923, is the oldest, still-operating grand municipal aquarium in America. The aquarium's collection includes species found at no other institution in the world, as well as species that are extinct in the wild.
Phone: (415) 321-8000
Region(s): California-Central, California-Northern
Order Now, Grade 5 Open Ocean
Open Ocean Teacher Guides may be ordered at our online store or directly from MARE.
