The 3rd grade curriculum focuses on how and why people explore the sea. Johns Hopkins BIOEYES environmental program, to learn about zebra fish: https://www.bioeyes.org/jhu.

This amazing opportunity allowed students to work hands on with nature, analyzing how they respond to stimuli and environmental factors.

Students explored how the zebra fish's similarities to humans help scientists make progress on medical research. Students were able to make observations of real life fish that were brought into the classroom by a BIOEYES educator.

Students in the 5th grade science class were learning about conserving natural resources, which is unit 6 of the curriculum. In collaboration with the technology teacher, students prepared a google slide show of what they learned about environmental conservation. Students complied data from multiple sources to embed graphs and images to their slideshows. Lastly, the slideshows were shared with family members and lower grade levels.

Homeroom teachers collaborated with the science teacher to provide students with an authentic fieldtrip. The students worked with a state park ranger and naturalist to learn about the native environment to support their understanding of the food chain which they were learning about in science class. Students composed reflections of their experiences. They also applied the knowledge they gained to the next science unit about food chains.

This field trip has become a tradition for our 1st grade students each year. We visit Great Kids Farm which is run by Baltimore City Public Schools' Food & Nutrition Services department. Students learn about nature and our environment and get benefits from learning outdoors. Immersion in nature provides a rich sensory experience that stimulates curiosity, creativity, and exploration. Physical activity associated with outdoor learning also promotes health and well-being, while the dynamic outdoor environment encourages collaboration, teamwork, and problem-solving skills. Students got to "taste the rainbow,' work in the garden and meet farm animals.

Students studied different natural habitats and why it is important to conserve and protect animals' natural habitats. They used recyclable materials to create and build habitat dioramas. After the completion of this project students did a gallery walk to compare and contrast each others habitats. We then displayed their dioramas for the school to observe.

Students attended a field trip to the harbor and learn about the amazing work being done by the Waterfront Partnership. This tour was very in-depth. The students learned about Mr. Trash Wheel, oysters' impact on the environment, the new wetlands at the Aquarium, and how to sort our waste. This filed trip aligned with our curriculum about the Bay and our future MWEE projects.

The science curriculum has a unit asking the question, 'What do plants need?' Students investigated seeds by planting their own and caring for the class's mini green house. They also investigated plants that were not planted in soil, identifying that all plants do not require 'dirt.' The students were very proud of the seeds when they started to sprout!

Second graders used the Design Engineering Process to build bird feeders using recyclable materials. Students observed that we do not often have birds in our school playground area but they are at the park across the street. This set the stage for the need of building bird feeders. They had to use 'CCB Bucks' to 'purchase' the materials. They only had $20 to spend to build their bird houses. Students were very proud of their hard work.

This is documentation for our first whole-school staff meeting of the 2024-25.

There is also documentation from this year 2025-26 as we have continued to strive to become a green school

This is documentation for another staff meeting in 2025-26. This is the second year we have made sure to include the whole staff in a conversation about our green school application. This artifact has our notes from the meeting, staff sign in sheet, and the agenda.

The goal of this event was to hold an assembly for all students and staff to introduce them to 'being green.' Students of all grade level learned what sustainability means and how we can 'Go Green' as a school community. Staff and students discussed our new recycling initiative and what their roles are in the process of collecting recyclable materials from the classroom. To make it fun and engaging we asked all staff and students to wear green on this day!

To help students learn more about the natural world outside of Baltimore we have watched documentaries about plastics in our ecosystem and had reflective conversations.

On this day we collaborated with Taste Wise Kids (https://www.tastewisekids.org/) who are on-going partners in our school. Students of all grade levels participated in Earth Day themed stations including: planting, worm composting, upcycling art projects, and an Earth Day- School wide promise.

Students will participate in activities geared towards our Green School initiatives. For our second annual Go Green day- students and teachers were made aware once again of our school effort to become a green school. Students learned about conserving natural resources and learned tips about how to save energy at home and school. Through a partnership with BGE students received boxes to take home that have several items that can be used at home to use energy and resources wisely.

While this day has not occurred, we are able to show documentation of the upcoming event that is planned to occur. We will once again be working with Taste Wise Kids to help support us in implementing a school wide annual activity.

We collaborated with ANBE, The Association of Nature-Based Education. We focused on bringing nature into our curriculum. She used information learned from the PD to work with the green club (4th and 5th graders) to create nature based games and activities to learn from. Some example include, counting with shells, making words with rocks that have letters on them, and matching leaf puzzles!

We collaborated with ANBE, The Association of Nature-Based Education. We focused on bringing nature into our curriculum. She used information learned from the PD to work with the green club (4th and 5th graders) to create nature based games and activities to learn from. Some example include, counting with shells, making words with rocks that have letters on them, and matching leaf puzzles!

We collaborated with ANBE, The Association of Nature-Based Education. We focused on bringing nature into our curriculum.

We collaborated with ANBE, The Association of Nature-Based Education. We focused on bringing nature into our curriculum.

We collaborated with ANBE, The Association of Nature-Based Education. We focused on bringing nature into our curriculum.

We collaborated with ANBE, The Association of Nature-Based Education. We focused on bringing nature into our curriculum. As the art teacher she has been able to use nature in her instruction more often

This sustainability project continues throughout the year. The Green Club chose to use some of their funds from the Green Healthy Smart Challenge (a program of the Baltimore City Office of Sustainability) to purchase trash grabbers and gloves. Our school is in an urban area and it is not safe to pick up trash with only gloves. Students must use the grabbers for each piece of trash. We do our best to recycle materials when possible. We do trash pick up every Thursday morning when the weather is agreeable. This student-led activity has grown in the second year- please see the connected record 2.

In the second year of trash clean up the students have expanded into the near by park and partnered with the Friends of Carroll Park, a nonprofit organization (https://www.friendsofcarrollpark.org/). This artifact will be referenced again in the 3rd section of the application. It was important to show how this small idea has grown larger and larger.

Our Green Club has been sharing 'Friday Facts' on the morning announcements since October 2024. The members of the club research their facts to share and practice throughout the week before speaking to the school. The students enjoy this activity so much we have grown to more than just green club students. Any student in the school can come to Ms. Bainbridge with an environmental fact and sign up to read it on the announcements.

After learning about about alternative energy sources, 5th grade students wanted to come up with alternative solutions to electricity. After a vote, They decided to work with solar energy to 'cook'. Students followed the design engineering process in order to create a design and execute. Students enjoyed a yummy, melted smore. (For many of them it was the first time they ever had one!)

This is an on-going student action shared by all the students in the school for breakfast, lunch, and afterschool programing. Students place food and drinks that they do not want on the share table for others. Any items left over are handed out as snacks at the end of the day. Additional fruits after that are donated to a staff member to feed to her chickens!

Members of the Green Club wanted to create an outdoor learning space. Unfortunately, a permanent structure was not the right choice for our school due concerns about our surrounding community. As a creative solution the students assembled a portable outdoor classroom complete with sitting pads, clips boards, and sturdy storage containers on wheels. Teachers and students 'sign out' the portable classroom to use for learning experiences on our school campus or to be taken across the street to Carroll Park.

Students/members from Green Club created learning games to play with the kindergarten/ pre-k class. The group used nature materials to make counting, letter recognition, and puzzle games. The older students designed, built, and implemented the games with the younger students. This was also documented in the Pre-k section for 1.1.

Here at CCB we are centrally located by many great opportunities in downtown Baltimore, which makes it a perfect location for walking field trips. We are able to reduce carbon emissions by not using buses. This artifact describes several walking field trips:

1. The Gifted and Advance Learning (GAL) students in 3rd and 4th grade walked a weekly workshop (every Friday) learning about the tools and projects the scientists at Early Charm are developing (https://www.earlycharm.com/)
2. The entire school walks to Carroll Park for Field Day since we don't have open space on our school grounds.
3. Our Green Club enjoys walking field trips to the park and neighborhood gardens.

Throughout the year a team of students lead the distribution of healthy foods and fruit received by community partners. Students prepare foods for the class homerooms and bring them to the classrooms. The food choices are always healthy foods. Then the student from the classroom hand out the fresh fruit to the students.

Our Green Club wanted to work with the youngest group of students at our school, Pre-K. Green club consists of students in 3rd-5th grades. They had tie-dyed their own shirts in green club and had a lot of fun, so they developed a plan to tie-dye shirts for the Pre-k students, read books about heathy choices, and share a heathy snack with them. Through food pantry donations and collaboration with the librarian, students joined the pre-k for over an hour to share the shirts, read them books, and eat healthy snacks together!

8/25 - Present Last year our green club only cleaned up around our school grounds. This year we were able to form a new partnership with the Friends of Carroll Park, a non-profit organization working to keep Carroll Park up and running for the surrounding neighborhood: https://www.friendsofcarrollpark.org/

We were able to reach out and started coming to the park each Thursday morning for trash pick ups. This made a big difference for the students and the park. This would be considered long term because we go each Thursday - it will have been happening for 7 months when this application is submitted.

10/2024 - Present Our school has been working for years and years with the local food pantry and its partners. Community members are able to come in often, several times a month to receive healthy food options. https://sowhatelse.org/ is a non-profit that works with local schools to bring surplus food. This cuts down on food waste and provides healthy options for the community members. Bon Secours is a part of our school community outreach that supports this opportunity. Our families appreciate the consistency of food availability.

Ms. Duffy, our Engligh Language Learning (ELL) educational lead has supported the school in an on-going relationship with a group of parents. This partnership has been reciprocal and will be mentioned again in 3.1.2. Throughout the year the school staff support this organization by holding several clothing drives - typically in the fall and spring. The staff brings in clothes that can be donated and reused by our families. This sustainable practice of reusing goods supports the green school initiative and our community.

CCB and TasteWise kids have partnered over many years to provide students with unique opportunities in sustainability and healthy eating.

1. TasteWise Kids' Days of Taste (DOT) is where students learn about healthy eating in the classroom, go on a field trip to their farm, and make salads at school with a local chef. Attached documentation shows the on-going partnership with our school for the past 3 years

2. TasteWise Kids and CCB collaborated to bring a school-wide Earth Day celebration in 2025. We plan to work with them again in Spring of 2026.

3. Working with our green club members to do an audit of our school and an action project.

Masonville Cove and the Living Classroom Foundation has supported environmental learning at CCB over the past two years. In the 2024-25 school year, they reach out because they had partnered with CCB in the past. Looking to continue that partnership we collaborated to bring a program for 3rd grade into the school. The students learned about Urban Heat and how this applies to their lives.

This year, 2025-26, we are collaborating to bring on-going learning experiences to 4th and 5th grade. This program will span over several sessions, taught by the science teacher and Living Classrooms - resulting in a field trip to Masonville Cove for those students at the end of the year.

Our school was awarded $2500 through the Green Healthy Smart Challenge. We were supported by the National Aquarium and the Baltimore City Office of Sustainability for this honor. These funds helped support our Green Club and the students efforts to start:

1. Portable outdoor classroom
2. Recycling bins for every classroom
3. Tools such as grabbers and gloves for trash pick ups
4. An outdoor learning experience for the 14 members to Genesee Valley Outdoor Learning Center *** At the time of submitting this application we were told that we also will receive the funds this spring as well!

Our school was able to collaborate with South Baltimore Gateway Partnership (https://sbgpartnership.org/). They had funding and an outreach effort with Pinehurst Landscaping. Together, over the course of several months, we coordinated the effort to landscape the gardens at CCB.
Our partnership with both of these groups continues. But this one day does shine bright which is seen in the before and after photos. The group was able to weed our gardens, lay weed block, mulch, plant native trees, and even supported us with a drain issue that would cause flooding to our playground when it rained.

We have an active parent group who created a butterfly garden in the back of our school. They came in on a Saturday and did it all! Unfortunately, I do not have pictures or emails for evidence. This special garden and the plate on the wall was included as an award!