Freshwater Mussel Activity Kits: Available to borrow for your classroom!
While we offer programs that allow students to engage in field research on freshwater mussels, we recognize that there may be many schools and groups that might not be able to visit with us to participate in a field program. We thought a Mussel Kit with activities that taught about mussel life history, their ecology and ecological services and the research being done in the FWW Hatchery might be a useful option for teachers who couldn’t bring students to the Interpretive Center.
In 2022, Mahari Brown our Alliance for Watershed Education-sponsored Fellow, began working on compiling ideas for the kits. He worked with students to develop a couple of ideas and also spoke with teachers to get their feedback.
In 2024 we partnered with Audubon Mid-Atlantic at the Discovery Center to fine tune the activities. After many iterations and piloting the kit at outreach events and in-classrooms, we are excited to share the news that they are ready to be signed out by teachers or groups wanting to use the kits for a week or two!
The Mussel Kit has 5 hands-on activities:
- Match the mussel shells. Use our Mussel ID cards to try to identify the species.
- Learn about the mussel life cycle by assembling a puzzle.
- Measure the turbidity of 3 water samples and learn how mussels influence turbidity in our aquatic systems.
- Engage in a simulation of field research – how we track growth and mortality rates in our juvenile mussels in the field.
- Model the propagation process that takes place in the lab in our Mussel hatchery.
Contact us if you would like more information or would like to check out a mussel kit! Stacey.Heffernan@phila.gov