| "It's something I think marine resource educators anywhere can use and adapt." | |
| Barbara Liukkonen, Minnesota Sea Grant |
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If people could immediately see the impact their everyday choices have on the environment, would it change how they live their lives? What if this experience was fun and everything bad that happened to the environment during this educational encounter could be taken back?
Educators with the University of Minnesota Sea Grant are giving students and many adults the chance to see how their daily decisions might impact Lake Superior, or other lakes in the region, through playing the Lake Superior Game.
"Whatever their choices are, they come to recognize that there are a lot of small actions that have scumulative effects on the lake," says Barbara Liukkonen, Minnesota Sea Grant's water resources education coordinator.
When playing the game, a bucket that is three-quarters full of clean, clear water represents the lake and is placed in the center of a 15-foot by 20-foot tarp with a map of the lake printed on it. There also are some plastic fish and a sign at the bottom of the bucket representing a shipwreck.
Players sit around the bucket and take on one of 35 roles, which will put them into potentially real-life situations and force them to make decisions.
For instance, Liukkonen says, one of the roles is for a homeowner who wants to have a weed-free lawn. The player must choose either to use herbicide or pull the weeds by hand.
If the weed killer is used, the player must add red food coloring, which represents pollution, to the bucket. If pulling weeds by hand is chosen, the player must do five jumping jacks to represent the effort of weeding.
Other pollutants include yellow food coloring for septic system failures; dirt, sand, and grass to represent erosion, drained wetlands, or other runoff; trash, such as candy wrappers or a crumpled napkin; cooked spaghetti to represent fish guts; and cooking oil or molasses to represent motor oil.
Liukkonen created the original version of the Lake Superior Game in 1987 for students in the fifth and sixth grades. Since then, it has been played in classrooms, educational events, and festivals, and even by lake associations and community groups.
In 1991, Sea Grant published the basics of the game so that it could be used by other marine educators. Since 1994, the game has been requested and sent to every province in Canada and to every state in the U.S. except Hawaii and Wyoming. The game was updated and reprinted in 2003.
"It's something I think marine resource educators anywhere can use and adapt," Liukkonen says, noting that it could easily be customized for other lakes, rivers, and even the ocean or an estuary.
She adds, "Really, it's something that's easy to do, it's engaging, and it compels people to look at their own beliefs and values."
To order the Lake Superior Game, call (218) 726-6191, or e-mail seagr@d.umn.edu. You can order it on-line by pointing your browser to www.seagrant.umn.edu/pubs/mailorder.html, going to the education category, and selecting item S3. Each game costs $2.50, with 10 or more copies costing $1 each. For more information, contact Barbara Liukkonen at (612) 625-9256, or liukk001@umn.edu.
