BP oil spill printable activity with vocab & letter writ

MES-Member Joined: 18 Feb 2010 Posts: 5

In the United States, the news has been saturated with information about the big oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. I've created a printable activity that helps students understand what has happened through reading and vocabulary practice, with some letter writing practice at the end to help them work through some of the worry and sadness they may be feeling.

You can download it here:

http://zachary-jones.com/english/2010/05/24/the-bp-oil-spill-questions-and-answers/

at the link that says - "Teachers: Click here to download a printable PDF version of this activity for use in class".

I also invite your students to post their letters in the comment section of that post so that they can interact with other English learners around the world. I have found that having an authentic audience motivates students greatly.

Posted: Mon Jun 07, 2010 10:22 am

We do a little "World News" section to many of our classes with JHS students, and this has been a topic of discussion.

This is a really good resource to help students visualize the size and impact of the spill;

http://www.ifitwasmyhome.com/#utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter

Also, on a more philosophical note (unrelated to the lesson), I have a disagreement with one of the things mentioned at the end of the site. I'm not pointing this disagreement at you (BMJ) and I think your post is great... but for the sake of my health I'm going to vent a bit...

Anyways, at the very end of the lesson it reads "But it often takes things like this to make us do what’s right." Shocked

While I agree that things like this make us take action, I think the fact that we can't act before the disaster says a lot about the state our modern education, society, and governmental organizations. Just like scientists had been predicting the exact scenerio of the New Orlean's flooding since the early 90's, scientists and organizations like the EPA have been criticizing our oil practices (and quite specifically the practices of BP) for many years. BP has been challenged on safety violations and encouraging/ignoring unsafe and unlawful work practices to save money for years. Their previous disasters have been challenged by communities and lawyers several times. Most of this has been ignored by the government (who even passed laws giving the oil companies more relaxed safety regulations, and keep in mind the pentagon contracts the majority of its oil from BP). The lawsuits have mostly failed, as most lawsuits against mega-corps fail.

Anyways, what I mean to say is that it doesn't actually TAKE a disaster to teach us a lesson, it just TOOK a disaster to teach us a lesson. I think our foresight and science is quite advanced enough that we can avoid disasters without having to live through them. And the fact that we don't is what is most alarming. (Check out the story of Tanaka Shozo [born in 1841], if you are interested in how long scientists have been raising the alarm. Actually, we made an entire English lesson out of his life story.).

I feel like a lot of people out there are just waiting around for all of our global warming, soil erosion, overfishing, and overdevelopment to get bad enough. As if we need to all feel the pains of our mistakes before we can decide to change our lifestyles, or before our government will have to make changes.

If you ask me, that's a bit unfair to the millions of future generations that are coming after us. And it's also a bit risky, since these problems are continually getting more and more expensive and impossible to fix.

Anyways, I gave up driving a car 6 years ago when I was 19 (I drove a sweet rav-4 since I was 16, and yes I do miss it time to time). It's been a little hard (10km bike rides to work in the rain and snow), but entirely worth it in terms of health, enjoyment, and money saved. But those benefits aside, I did this is because I was a part of the problem and I knew it.

In 20, 30, or 40 years I'm not going to tell my kids that I didn't know what I was doing, when it was quite obvious all along. More than that, I'm not going to tell them I did know, but couldn't do anything about it, when it is quite obvious I could.

Anyways, to finish... for teachers... the core of our problems are located in our educational system. We've created a dependency on competitiveness through teaching competitiveness, we've created a culture of angry debates over things such as global warming and evolution (keep in mind, most of the debates on these things ended in the 20th century, as far as science is concerned) by teaching debates, and we've created mindless conformity by teaching it, and passive behavour... and so on.

Oh well... this is the wrong place to be venting... so I guess I'll stop. And maybe find the right place. Neutral

Posted: Mon Jun 07, 2010 10:28 pm

Certainly, this is a big subject and the message I think we all want to get across is things need to change and what Z. Sensei is maybe trying to say is we should be correcting ourselves now, heeding warnings like they're facts, and not waiting for whatever reason.

Did you see my link to the video on the Pacific Garbage patch. It's not just driving cars and traffic/trucking goods, running our lights and air conditioners. Everything about the consumer lifestyle and throw-away life-style is threatening the world.

Obviously, this current spill is horrible. I'm saddened every day to think of the damage that we have caused to the Earth for our greed.

On a local level, my house, I look around and see all of the plastic items that I have. I watch the bag or two of trash go out almost every day. And we are actually pretty careful about what we buy and how much trash we create. We have a compost for all raw trash, bring our own shopping bags or card board boxes, use cloth diapers.

What we try to do these days is buy less and use/reuse more. I have a dirty pair of sneakers that I've had for the past 6 years or so. I really would like to get a new pair, but the ones I have are in pretty good shape. No holes, nothing torn, just old and a little dirty. So, I haven't bought new shoes.

I'm only 35 but I have clothes from more than 15 years ago that I still wear. I try to buy things that will last if I take care of them. Then I spend the extra time to take care of them. I use and wear things that are a bit raggedy. I try not to buy disposable items when a little bit more effort means I can use something else. I will buy something that is more expensive if it means less waste. I will pay more for service or products to support a private/local business, rather than a corporation.

It's too bad we can't just live, work, grow, buy, sell, and be in our own communities anymore. Not even in our own cities, states or countries even.

I'm no saint, that's for sure. I have done and continue to do my part to help further our current state. I swore I wouldn't buy a drink out of the vending machines anymore, but just did last week. ... I disgust myself and my selfish choices lately. A little extra planning and we don't need to create the waste or spend the money for these conveniences. Sometimes we forget about these problems that aren't hitting us right in the face.

Anyway, we all can do our part in our own way. Z. Sensei is biking instead of driving and instead of purchasing a car that will eventually be trash somewhere. In summary, I think that we all need to do everything we can to reduce, reuse, suffer inconvenience, consume less, and use longer in whatever way(s) we can.

This is all really really sad.

Posted: Mon Jun 14, 2010 10:09 am

The pacific garbage patch is a great topic, easy for kids to conceptualize, understand, and even take action on (you can take them outside and pick up a few peices of trash in a public park, for instance). Hadn't really thought about it.