Cypress-Fairbanks Independent School District northwest of downtown Houston, Texas, serves almost 70,000 students and has nearly 4,000 teachers. The school district has a unique Science Resource Center where enthusiastic science teachers plan huge exhibits for students who are brought to the Center. During the 2002-2003 school year, all first graders from 34 elementary schools visited Gulf Mysteries at the Center.

The entire exhibit with hands-on games and craft tables developed after teacher Denise Martin went on a "Barbados Expedition" and saw hawksbill sea turtles nesting.

"I was able to switch the focus to the Gulf of Mexico with its sea turtles, fish, coral reefs and other fascinating marine exhibits," said Denise. "The entire exhibit meets the criteria of the Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills (TAKS) guidelines."

The children first make a take-home paper sea turtle and then move on to a sea turtle survival game, a tangled crab craft, a table showing sand sizes from different beaches, a coral reef exhibit, (complete with a paper diving mask) a color chart for matching seashells, an endangered species exhibit, a sea shell identification game and other interesting tables and exhibits.
Even if your school district does not have a Science Resource Center, you can use one or more of these creative teaching tools!

Thanks to Denise Martin and Susan Weidenmeyer of the Science Resource Center, we are able to bring photographs of every exhibit and complete instructions for the Sea Turtle survival game: Race to the Sea.