• Outdoor Challenge

Take a 15 minute walk in your backyard, forest, or local park and write down what you see, smell, hear or touch. Write down 3 questions that come to mind while you are observing the natural world. Research answers using three different references. Then take a friend or a parent back outside and explain what you did and learned in the process. Repeat weekly. 

• Questions and Assignments for Saving the Places We Love

1. What is your favorite story in the book and why does it resonate with you?
2. Describe in detail your favorite, real-life, outdoor space and the challenges it faces.
3. Pick one of the conservationists in the book and discuss their accomplishments.
4. Make a Top Ten list of things you could do to reduce your impacts on our natural world and develop a plan of personal action. How will you be able to change your own behavior?
5. How can you help others understand the importance of behavior change?
6. Have someone edit your story from #2 above (300 to 800 words) and send it along with two photographs to https://savingtheplaces.com/share-your-story/.
7. Select 3 Facebook posts about nature from the Saving The Places Facebook page, comment on them, and share them with your network.

• Questions and Assignments for The Chesapeake Watershed

1. Describe the extent of your local watershed.
2. Have you had similar encounters with nature as the author describes in his book?
3. Describe an experience where you were outdoors and you encountered an animal or a natural habitat that was memorable.
4. Where does the water come from that flows out of the spigot in your kitchen?
5. Where does the water go that lands on the roof of your house? Discuss as much of its pathway as you know.
6. Where does the wastewater go that drains from your kitchen sink?

• Writing Assignment based on Saving the Places We Love

Write a 3 to 5 page article in the same format as each of the chapters in Saving the Places We Love. Start by describing a personal experience that you have had in one of your favorite outdoor natural places. Speak from both the mind and the heart being sure you bring in your affection for the location and why it means so much to you. Follow this with a discussion that identifies the history of the place and how it has been protected and maintained. Then go into a discussion of what are the threats to its existence. Finish the piece by addressing what will be needed to ensure that this special place is here for you to visit throughout your life.

• Writing Assignment based on The Chesapeake Watershed

Write a 3 to 5 page narrative describing the watershed where you live. This paper is intended to be a creative essay rather than a research paper; however, you will be expected to draw from resources like The Chesapeake Watershed. Your audience is your local community. Your purpose is to describe to them this watershed of which we are a part. You should make sure to address the connections between our activities locally and the environmental health of the rest of the watershed and the bay itself. How would you tailor your writing for an audience of your friends and colleagues? Do you want to focus on the environmental problems, or would you feel more inclined to tell a story about your personal connection with the region?