Author Archives: oceanlifeeducation

Behind the Scenes at Ocean Life Education

They say never work with children or animals – but Richard Coward is happy to do both. The director of Ocean Life Education has spent the past 13 years combining two of his passions – protecting marine life and inspiring young minds. But the time spent in classrooms, early learning centres and at community events makes up only a fraction of the working day for Richard and his team of educators.

The day usually starts before first light, checking on the crew of animal ambassadors to make sure they are healthy and raring to go on an adventure. The creatures are chosen on a rotational basis to ensure they receive rest days between their public appearances, minimising fatigue. Bags of oxygenated water are filled to provide a safe and comfortable space inside the travel tubs which will become their home for their time on the road.

Apart from the cargo of animals, the van is loaded with extra salt water, games, artefacts, toys and books depending on the programs booked for the day. Details are checked and notes read through to make sure the educator is as prepared as possible for the day ahead.
Then they join the line-up of commuters, criss-crossing South East Queensland as they slowly progress towards their first show of the day.

Unpacking the animals and exhibits is an artform in itself, with tubs carefully stacked to limit the numbers of trips back and forwards. We allow half an hour to set up, giving the animals new water so they can breathe easily while on display. We arrange them in a user-friendly way that allows enthusiastic little participants ample room to feel their way around our very tactile exhibits. Children wash their hands without soap to ensure no chemicals or sunscreen residue is passed onto our animals.

We normally present multiple sessions at any one location, quickly re-setting between shows to make it fresh for the new group. Pack up time takes another half hour as water is changed again to prepare the animals to move to a new location where we repeat the whole process.
When the final program is over and everything secured in the van, we head home to return our animal ambassadors to their tanks and begin the feeding regime. We have half a dozen different food sources to distribute to our creatures, their diets carefully regulated to mimic conditions in the wild.

On days when we don’t have displays to set up, we maintain our tanks, receiving 1,500 litres of ocean water every couple of weeks which we store and use when needed.
Even though our animals may only be on display for short periods in the day, a lot goes into keeping them happy and healthy. But we know all the cleaning, all the prep work and all the sitting in traffic is worth it if it helps the next generation learn to love, appreciate and protect our waterways.

Rock Pools Rock!

A treasure trove of marine delights hides in plain sight along our coastline.

Rock pools are tiny but complex ecosystems, where only the hardiest of inhabitants survive the onslaught that nature throws at them.

Pounded by waves, whipped by the wind and exposed to the sun, the creatures who lie within have learnt to adapt to their constantly changing world.

At high tide they are connected to the greater ocean environment, but when the water level drops, they are isolated, and vulnerable to predators and the elements.

Water temperatures can vary by as much as 20 degrees in the shallowest of pools from the intensity of the midday sun at low tide, to the flushing of cooling currents when the shoreline floods again.

Making the most of available shelter is the key to survival in the inter tidal zone. Sea urchins wedge themselves into cramped crevices, sea stars and sea cucumbers cling to the underside of rocks, making them often invisible at a casual glance.

Spotting the life inside these pools takes patience and care. Small fish will dart to the edges when noise, vibrations or shadows alert them to potential predators but stay quiet and still for long enough and they pop back out.

A carefully concealed creature can give away its hidey-hole by one misplaced limb that can take minutes of constant gazing to spy.

And while it may be tempting to delve a little deeper into the darker patches, beware the dangers that lurk within.

Blue ringed octopus are only little but their venom packs a punch – one bite from these highly venomous cephalopods can kill a human in minutes. A hands off approach with rock pools is the safest option.

But if visiting the coast is not a practical option, Ocean Life Education can bring the rock pool to you in a safe yet interactive incursion designed to showcase the animals that live around our beaches.

Sea stars, sea cucumbers and sea urchins can all be carefully handled during our visits to schools, early learning centres and special events, as we explain the important role our oceans play in keeping our planet healthy.

We offer a wide range of programs that align with the Australian curriculum and cover topics such as adaptations, habitats and human impact.

Let Ocean Life Education inspire your students to become interested in coastal environments and as they look, listen and touch their way to a greater understanding of the marine world, they will start to see why rock pools rock.

School’s in for Marine Life Lovers

Education Innovator Sir Ken Robinson recently noted: “A great teacher obviously knows their material, but the real skill is engaging them in the material, getting them excited and curious, and firing up their imaginations.”

And that’s where we come in!

Ocean Life Education delivers fun marine education incursions, where students are given the opportunity to interact with a variety of live marine creatures.

Our programs are all closely aligned with the Australian National Curriculum, delivering lessons across a broad range of topics including animal habitats, adaptations and classification.

Through carefully controlled contact, children learn why animals’ look and feel the way they do, how their bodies function, what their individual roles are in their environment and therefore why we need to look after them.

Responding to interactive learning

We understand all children are different and absorb information in different ways.

As passionate educators ourselves, the staff at Ocean Life Education value the importance of connecting students with their subject and showing them that science is a living, breathing part of their world.

Children respond extremely well to having real animals at their fingertips – this one-on-one experience provides a greater depth of understanding which leads to the desire to protect them.

Choose a program that suits current unit themes

What better way to understand Life Cycles, than to see one of our baby sharks at close quarters and observe the eggs they hatched from and note the often significant differences from their adult version?

We will tailor our programs to your classrooms’ current unit theme for all levels of school learning.

Leaders in environmental education

Ocean Life Education is proud to be involved in educating tomorrow’s leaders in environmental awareness and protection.

Our hope is to imprint in every Australian a sense of ownership and protectiveness of our marine environment, and together we will lead the world in the changes necessary for a healthy planet.

What to expect:

  • Linked to the Australian National Curriculum
  • Qualified and experienced Marine Educators
  • Live Marine Animal Interaction Blue linckia seastars, thorny seastars, black sea cucumber, tropical sea cucumber, sea urchins, fresh water turtle and baby bamboo shark 
  • Shark jaws, shells and fascinating artefacts in activity area
  • FREE colourful bookmark to take home!
  • FREE risk assessment
  • FREE coming to visit poster
  • FREE thorough supporting information, videos and blogs

What teachers think:

“ONE OF THE BEST INCURSIONS I HAVE EVER SEEN – KEEN, INTERESTING PRESENTERS WHO ARE TRULY PASSIONATE ABOUT THEIR SUBJECT!” Jasmine Molineux, Patricks Road State School, (Year 2) 2018

For more information, visit our School Programs page or Contact Us to request a program outline for your year level.

 

The Cost of Christmas

“Tis the season for excitement and excess… and while our waist lines and bank balances may bear the brunt of our festive good cheer, the oceans suffer too.

Every year Australians spend more than $16 billion celebrating Christmas (which is almost $1,000 per adult!) – half of that goes on gifts.

The vast majority of presents come shrouded in plastic –  the enemy of all things marine.

In Britain alone, 125,000 tonnes of packaging is purchased at Christmas – multiply that by all the other countries who have also bought into the December consumer frenzy and that’s a whole lot of waste that needs to be dealt with.

When it comes to gifts, ideally we should embrace the idea of experiences over physical items – a ticket to a Marine Biologist for a Day Program run by Ocean Life Education will be remembered long after the holidays have passed!

Likewise, donating to your favourite charity – be it humanitarian or conservation will help improve the balance on this planet.

But if products need to be bought, how the packaging is disposed of becomes paramount – artificial floating debris gets ingested by curious marine life making it the scourge of the sea.

Most plastics and cardboard can be recycled – but not the polystyrene foam often used to protect electronic presents.

The paper the gift comes wrapped in also takes a massive toll on nature – it’s estimated 50,000 trees are harvested every year in Australia just to produce the colourful embellishment that is ripped and discarded within seconds of reaching its recipients.

Paper is a preferable choice to foil but a better option is to use homemade wrapping created from recycled material or reusable presentation boxes.

Batteries too have become a major headache for the environment – 8,000 tonnes of them are thrown away in Australia every year.  Switching to rechargeable options has a third less impact on the planet.

Ocean Life Education has a range of programs that help to inform people of all ages about ways to be more mindful of our footprint on earth – our mobile aquarium can come to you for all sorts of occasions, giving the gift of interacting with our beautiful marine animals.

Being conservation minded in the festive season is not about sucking the joy out of Christmas – it’s about finding a way to celebrate that doesn’t cost the earth it’s future.