Watershed Management Bureau

  Interactive Lake Ecology

"Guide to Field Studies" Now Available

Are you a teacher interested in lakes and ponds? Do your students want to know why lakes have so many different shapes, or why some lakes are deep and other lakes are shallow? Then you should try the Interactive Lake Ecology curriculum from the New Hampshire Department of Environmental Services!

The Interactive Lake Ecology (ILE) curriculum was first initiated in 1991. A Concord (NH) High School science teacher and DES biologists developed the curriculum to provide New Hampshire middle school students with information about lake ecology.

The curriculum included two workbooks: a student workbook and a teacher's guide. These quickly became popular throughout the U.S. and eventually were used in other countries as well. As a result of ILE's popularity and use throughout the U.S., biologists revised ILE to reflect a more general lake ecology curriculum. Two new chapters were added to give students a better understanding of how lakes are formed and how non-native species can devastate our natural waters.

The improved Interactive Lake Ecology curriculum is now available for teachers. The Student Workbook now contains nine chapters and includes an appendix with vocabulary exercises, experiments, and a glossary of terms found throughout the text. The corresponding Teachers' Reference is comprised of all the text in the Student Workbook, as well as answers to all questions and exercises, and hints for the experiments.