During this semester-long project, students researched one of the 63 US National Parks specifically focusing on highlighting information that other 4th graders would enjoy learning about each park, as well as uplifting stories of the indigenous communities that first lived on and took care of this land. As part of their research process, students wrote letters to park rangers at each of their national parks to gather information. We also went on an overnight camping field trip to our nearest national park, Joshua Tree, to experience firsthand the beauty that these parks aim to preserve. Throughout the pages of this book you will find an overview of each park, information about ecology and recommended activities for kids and families to enjoy. Through the “Every Kids Outdoors” program, all 4th graders and their families in the United States have free access to all US National Parks for one year. We hope this book inspires other adventurers to explore and help protect our beautiful park system!
Teacher Reflection
Aside from learning all about the beautiful national parks in our country, my biggest learning takeaway from this project was the power a published book has in terms of promoting high-quality student work. Knowing that their writing would be professionally published, students worked hard to craft thoughtful and informative paragraphs. I would absolutely have students create a book as a final product again for this reason alone. For future iterations of this project I would love to have more experts involved sooner and involve them in giving us feedback on our work along the way. The help and support we received from the US National Park Service was instrumental in launching our project, but including experts throughout the project instead of just at the beginning would help build a stronger partnership between our students and the national park community.
—Michelle
Student Reflections
I learned that national parks are amazing and there is a lot to learn about each of them.
—Sumi N
I learned that there are special layouts for making books!
—Benjamin L
My favorite part of this project was when we got to Zoom meet with a park ranger who helped us launch our project!
—Penelope S
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