The SEMIS Coalition Blog
The place to connect, learn and share perspectives in place-based learning
Welcome to our SEMIS Coalition blog! A commons-based digital space for shared resources, images, and more. It’s a place for you to ask questions, interact with peers, and keep current with the latest Southeast Michigan Stewardship Coalition activities.
Browse through the most recent posts below, or browse past posts by category via the toolbar on the right.
SHARED STORIES Hope of Detroit Academy Recycling dumped tread into community-based cred
How do you turn a dumping ground into a teachable space? Hope of Detroit Academy (HODA) students engage in many community-based projects as self-defined stewards of their community. While working on other projects, illegal dumping came up in student conversations as a...
SHARED STORIES Neinas Elementary Students understand the LAND in Southwest Detroit
What does a Great Lakes prairie have to do with classroom learning? NeinasElementary, in collaboration with The Greening of Detroit, DPS and Friends of The Rouge, engaged students outside the classroom in their local ecology. Their...
SHARED STORIES Detroit Institute of Technology at Cody
The Green Team gains STEAM at DIT-CODY With the support of the community and their teachers, students at DIT-CODY are taking the lead in developing STEAM-based solutions to pressing Detroit Public School sustainability needs, like energy, insulation, recycling, and...
SHARED STORIES Jack Harvey Elementary School The life-cycle of salmon brings ecology to life
It’s hard to find a better example of project-based learning than how students at Jack Harvey Elementary spent their school year — raising and releasing salmon. Through the Michigan DNR’s Salmon in the Classroom program, students raised and cared for salmon in their...
Further research and writing on PBSE and EcoJustice Education
Articles, Book Chapters, White Papers, and Book References Developing Teachers' Capacity for Ecojustice Education and Community-Based Learning; by Ethan Lowenstein, Rebecca Martusewicz, & Lisa Voelker; Teacher Education Quarterly, Fall 2010 (PDF) Conference...
The Southeast Michigan Stewardship Coalition Community Forum
What stood out to participants from last year's forum... “What stands out today for me was learning new things and learning how to listen.” “The young students from Ann Arbor presenting on the Ann Arbor carbon plume and the complexities of the Flint water crisis.”...
Self-Determination Theory and Place-Based Education
Written by Greg Smith. One of the arguments I’ve used to justify place- and community-based educational approaches has been tied to the way I’ve seen it increase students’ intrinsic motivation to learn and participate. I’ve suggested that this enhanced motivation is...
Education as if the World Mattered: Belonging and Interdependence as Education’s Purpose
Written by Bill Boyle and Ethan Lowenstein. Chet Bowers asks a question that we should all be considering, especially those of us who serve as educators: “How do we live more interdependent lives based on practices that are less dependent on a monetized world, that...
Challenge Letters! A tool for inquiry-based and community focused learning
Some Background There are many ways to structure place-based learning experiences with students. In place-based education, you can give students a range of freedom to make choices. Sometimes it is difficult to frame a place-based inquiry in a way that is clear to...
Sturgeon in a Changing Great Lakes
By Matt Siegfried Display image courtesy of Fresh Water and Marine Image Bank, University of Washington The sturgeon, or Na’me in Anishinaabemowin (the language of the many Great Lakes First Nations communities), is an ancient fish just emerging from danger of...