Green Community Teaching Kit

The Green Community Teaching Kit provides a comprehensive approach to studying green, sustainable communities. Students and educators can create a town from the ground up --complete with model buildings, land use categorization, and planning strategies. Like the Museum's other educational programs, students create their own community by following the steps of the design process. Through this process, students develop skills such as communication, cooperative learning, decision making, analysis, creativity, and innovation.

The Kit introduces students to the town of Grayville, a fictional community synthesized from a combination of real-life case studies. While studying the problems of Grayville, students are introduced to the basics of urban planning including land use and zoning. Students then explore the principles of sustainable communities through the investigation of real life towns and cities and through an examination of green buildings and sustainable technologies. They then use these concepts to re-plan Grayville into a new, livable, green community named Greenville.

The curriculum and materials in the Kit are designed to be reused each school year. The Kit includes a large map, lesson plans, and visual aids, all of which are made out of durable, environmentally-friendly materials. The Kit is designed for students in grades 5-8.

Curriculum Plan

• Aligned with National Standards of Learning
• Seven core lesson plans plus additional optional lesson plans
• Core lessons require approximately five hours of classroom time
• Orientation section to help you organize lessons to fit your teaching schedule
• Supplemental resource section including vocabulary, books, web sites, videos, and organizations

 Teaching Tools

• 5 foot x 5 foot Map: Made from durable paper. Help turn Grayville into Greenville by physically creating the new, green community on the map.
• Color-coded Land Use Cards: Plan a new community from the ground up.
• Building Boxes: Create your own buildings; combine for larger structures.
• Colorful Posters: Featuring "5 Big Ideas of Green Building" and "5 Big Ideas of Green Communities".
• Full Color Postcards: Learn about existing model green communities.

Code: 75258

Member and Educator price: $150.00 (No additional discount available).