Electronic Waste

Click on this link to find the reading text. Then try to do some of the exercises below.Compiled and designed by Anne Cairns, courtesy of Inorganic Market.

E-Waste Vocabulary exercises

Click on this link to view or print the worksheets.

A Message of Life

CLICK ON THE ARROW TO WATCH THE VIDEO.
Tasks after watching:

I. Discuss with your partner:
a. how the young man changes through different phases of his life;
b. a viewpoint of yours that has changed as you were becoming older.

II. Consider the following:
1. What is that that makes this video clip a commercial?
2. Do you think it is effective?
3. How can commercials influence those who watch them?
4. Are commercials more powerful on TV or in the print?

Say your opinion:
1. Do the young people today face more problems in the world than the older generations?
2. Does the individual behaviour impact the future of the world?
3. Does the technology make people happier?
4. What could be disastrous consequences of using too much technology?
5. Have you changed anything in your life that is now more environment friendly?

III. Compare:
1. the way people lived before and after the 4th (internet) technological revolution;
2. the way people communicated in the past and now;

IV. Speculate how people will live in the future if we don't stop the environmental degradation. In a group write a warning message to your Prime Minister.

IV. Listening comprehension / writing / reading
1. Write down the scrypt of this commercial. Ask your teacher for help in difficult spots. Print it out.
2. Cut the text in smaller segments and have your partner re-compose it.

Ocean Acid Test by Oceana

CLICK ON THE ARROW TO WATCH THE VIDEO.

I. Comprehension task during listening:
Circle the right answer:
1. Ocean acidification is due to a. carbon dioxide b. dead fish c.garbage.
2. Eco systems of the oceans are a. fine b. in danger c. dead.
3. Oceans absorb about a. 15% b. 30% c. 50% of CO2.
4. Added carbon reduces a. water b. light c. carbonate in the ocean.
5. Carbonate is a building block of a. ocean water b. ocean ships c. shells.
6. If acidification keeps growing, it could a. grow b. decrease c. disolve shells.
7. Calcification is formation of a. shells b. pebbles c. fish eggs.
8. An eco system is in danger if any one species a. lives b. thrives c. dies.
9. The content of CO2 in the atmosphere should not exceed 450 ppm (parts per million).
10. If it continues at the current rate, at the end of the century the ocean acidity will a. double b. triple c. remain the same.

II. Share your thoughts and information with your group:
1. Why are alternative energy sources good for the oceans?
2. Make a list of everyday things that are carbon dependent.
3. Come up with a list of changes in your life style that can reduce carbon emissions.
4. Find on the internet how you can measure your "carbon footprint". Go to www.carbonfootprint.com

Plant trees for change with Nobel Prize winner Wangari Maathai

Official Google Blog: Plant trees for change with Nobel Prize winner Wangari Maathai

1. Discuss about:
a) benefits of forests
b) harms of deforestation.

2. Find facts about Canadian forests and the forests in your country. Write a report and bring it to the class.

3. Find more information about the first African Nobel Prize winner, Wangari Maathai. Bring the facts to your group and write a short biography together.

3. Draw a poster for the International Year of Forests, 2011.

Polar Bears in Jeopardy

Global warming is melting the polar ice caps, robbing the bears of the ice floes they need to hunt prey. Forced to fast for longer periods, polar bears will become too thin to reproduce and many scientists predict they could become extinct by the end of this century. At the same time, their natural habitat is under increasing assault from expanded development

TASKS

1. Discuss:

• What are the consequences of global warming on the polar bear?
• The polar bear is the most polluted animal. What do you think, is the reason for that?
• What is the "development" that harms the polar bear habitat?
• If the polar bear went extinct, what would be the consequences?

2.

Rewrite the first two sentences using relative clauses instead of the participles.

Teaching ESL for Sustainability

Click here to view our slides at the workshop Teaching ESL for Sustainability at the 2009 TESL Ontario Conference.

Teaching about and Appreciating Nature

Click here to view my slide presentation at the TESL Ontario Conference in October 2010.

Endangered Species in Canada

Visit this website to find an updated information and degrees of risk for animal and plant species in Canada:
www.sararegistry.gc.ca/default_e.cfm

We are what we buy

Make your buying decisions on the following questions:
1. Is this purchase something I need?
2. Do I already own something that will serve the same purpose?
3. Can I make or borrow something that will do the same thing?
4. Is my purchase locally made?
5. Is the product made with environmentally sustainable materials?
6. Was it produced by workers who are treated fairly under safe and healthy working conditions?
7. Can I easily compost or recycle the product when I'm finished with it?

Add your own question based on the experience from your home country.

Discuss with your group which of these tips have priority.

HOW MAPLE SYRUP __________ (MAKE)

1. Use passive forms of the verbs in parentheses:

First, a hole __________ (drill) in the trunk of a maple tree.
A spout, called a spile, __________ (hammer) into the hole.
The sap from the tree __________ (collect).
Then the sap __________ (boil) into maple syrup.
The water __________ (evaporate) by boiling for a long time.
The hot syrup __________ (pour) into bottles and __________ (seal).
Maple candy can also __________ (make)
Maple syrup __________ (use) for cooking and baking.


2.
Cut stripes with one sentence on each and have students order them in a paragraph.

Gorillas and cell Phones

Toronto Zoo has a cell phone drop off program called "Phone Apes". If you decide to take your class for a visit there,maybe you'll find this material useful not only to teach the language, but to instill some Earth watcher's ideas along.
Conservationists point out that recycling cell phones protects landfills from the many potentially hazardous chemicals found in the phones, including antimony, arsenic, copper, cadmium, lead, and zinc.

But cell phones also include coltan, a mineral extracted in the deep forests of Congo in central Africa, home to the world's endangered lowland gorillas.

Fueled by the worldwide cell phone boom, Congo's out-of-control coltan mining business has in recent years led to a dramatic reduction of animal habitat and the rampant slaughter of great apes for the illegal bush-meat trade.

"Most people don't know that there's a connection between this metal in their cell phones and the well-being of wildlife in the area where it's mined," said Karen Killmar, the associate curator of mammals at the San Diego Zoo.

TREES

Match the trees with their parts:

OAK TREE - ACORN
PINE - CONE
MAPLE - KEY
HAZEL - CATKINS
CHESTNUT - SPINES
LOCUST - PODS
BASSWOOD - LEAFY BRACT

Mystery Things

1.
They are called "monarchs of the mist".
They are the highest of all living things on earth although they grow from seeds not larger than tomato seeds.
They were far more spread during the age of dinosaurs. Their fossils have been found in Asia,Europe and North America. Now their natural range is reduced to a belt 35 miles wide and 450 miles long, from extreme southern Oregon to Monterey County, California.


2. It looks like a mass of dead leaves, moldy fungus or a termite's nest when you see it high up in a tree,hanging upside down. It lives only in Central America, where it is very rare. It has long, coarse hair and four long limbs. It has three long claws that look like hooks. Its face looks like it is always smiling.It moves extremely slowly because it drags its body as its legs do not support it. It spends 18 out of 24 hours sleeping.

ANSWERS: 1. redwoods (sequoias); 2. three-toe sloth

Walking in High Park

We are going to High Park to explore and enjoy the sights. Complete the following tasks:
1. Look around and find:

3 types of deciduous trees
2 types of conifers
3 types of birds
a prairie
a slope
a path
a monument
a sculpture
a flower bed
a pond
fish
a bridge

2. Find some information about Colborne Lodge and write a paragraph to read in your class.
3. Look for the memorial to John and Joanna Howard. Describe the way how you got there. Find out about the Howards and share with your class.
4. Finish the sentence with appropriate verb forms:
If you ___________ (come) to the pond in 1837, you ___________ (find) yourself virtually standing on the shore of Lake Ontario.
5. Describe people's activities in the Park.

Awareness Walk

Walking in nature can be so much more than hurrying to a destination.Walking is a doorway to being in your body instead of your head, experiencing instead of thinking.When you walk with awareness, you can regroup and return to your centre, clear your thoughts and feelings, and align your inner and outer worlds.It can be a time when you regain your perspective and experience yourself as healthy, integrated and alive. Nature around you, breathing cleaner air and relaxed mood, will replenish your energy and relieve stress from over-committed life.

BIODIVERSITY

Fill in words that fit in the text:

It is essential that we do all we can to help protect ____________. Biodiversity is responsible for the ____________ of the air we breathe, and the water we ____________. We rely on biodiversity to provide us with ____________, both animal and vegetable, as many of the plants we eat require animals to ____________ them. We also have biodiversity to thank for fertile ____________ to plant our crops in, the regulation of ____________ on earth, and also as the source of many of our ____________ for healing. In short, biodiversity provides us with everything we need to ____________.

 

 

Solutions: biodiversity, purification, drink, food, pollinate,
soils,
climate,
medicines,
live.

Mountain Top Removals in West Virginia

Put the verbs in parentheses into the right form:


Last week, the state of West Virginia announced that it _________ (sue) both the Environmental Protection Agency and the the Army Corps of Engineers over mountain top removal mining regulations. It said they ___________ (be) "unlawful" and "based on inadequate science."

West Virginia's Gov. Joe Manchin accused the government that they purposefully__________ (delay) 23 pending mountain top removal mining permits and ___________ (harm) the state's economy in the process.

Manchin alleged that no specific law or government regulation __________ (keep) the permits from passing.

Solutions: would sue, were, delayed, harmed, had kept

Saving South African Leopards with Fake Fur

(adapted from www.care2.com)

Use the active or passive form of the verbs in parentheses:

 

This is one example of a major conservation blind spot in southern Africa right now: the widespread and rapid loss of leopard populations to an illegal yet culturally entrenched skin trade. The most frightening thing is not the rate at which these magnificent big cats ___________ (hunt), but just how little the public___________ (know) about the trade.

The major demand for skins ___________ (create) by the four million strong religious group known as the Shembe church. The Shembe ___________ (adopt) leopard skins into their ceremonial life from their traditional place in Zulu culture where for hundreds of years the skins ___________ (serve) as a sign of the royal family. Now, what was once the reserve of the elite ___________ (search) after by millions of people, and at a single gathering upward of 600 leopards skins can ___________ (see). In a country highly sensitive about race and culture, stopping a practice like this -- however illegal -- through the use of the law, is almost impossible. It is an accepted norm for too many people.

 

are being hunted, knows, is created, have adopted, served, is sought, be seen

Ocean Storm

Put connectors on the blanks:

(This is a modified passage from Rachel Carson's book "The Sense of Wonder")

One stormy autumn night ________ my nephew was about twenty months old I wrapped him in a blanket ________ carried him down to the beach in the rainy darkness. Out there, just at the edge of where-we-couldn't-see, big waves were thundering in, dimly seen white shapes _________ boomed ________ shouted _______ threw great handfuls of froth at us. Together we laughed for pure joy - he a baby meeting for the first time the wild tumult of Oceanus, I with the salt of half a lifetime of sea love in me. ____ I think we felt the same response to the vast, roaring ocean _______ the wild night around us.

Solutions: when, and, that, and,and, But, and.