There are no workshops scheduled at this time, please check back soon or sign up to receive email updates. The description below summarizes our 2009 spring workshops.

Teachers! Come learn about the incredible outdoor classroom and natural laboratory available at the Elkhorn Slough National Estuarine Research Reserve. The Reserve offers a variety of habitats for your class to explore, including salt marsh, mudflats, woodlands, and grasslands. The exhibits in our Visitor Center feature unique views of the more difficult to see and often rather peculiar creatures of the Slough. With over 90% of the state's wetlands lost, the Elkhorn Slough Reserve offers a rare and important opportunity to teach the value of preserving wetlands and to witness the creatures that depend on these habitats.

Above: microscopic plankton, exploring the exhibits, lined shore crab

• Basic Workshop: Opportunities for Discovery in Nature The purpose of this workshop is to provide educators with the tools needed to lead an informative and enjoyable field trip. You, the teacher, will become the naturalist tour guide and will have access to teaching kits for the trail or classroom, chaperone packs, field equipment including binoculars and plankton nets, and a laboratory with microscopes. Only teachers completing this workshop will be certified to bring classes to the Reserve and to use all the educational facilities. All workshop participants will receive the Elkhorn Slough Curriculum Manual, background material on the Visitor Center exhibits and a variety of useful posters, handouts, and a certificate of completion.

• Advanced Workshop: Microscopic Explorations We will use the microscopes and digital video scopes in our new teaching laboratory to explore both aquatic plankton and terrestrial plants…. the very beginning of food chains that we all depend on, and the source of the oxygen that we breathe. This will be the first in a series of advanced workshops that will be available to all teachers who have completed the Basic Workshop this year or in previous years.

Time: The workshops begin at 8:00 am with a continental breakfast and informal networking time. Formal instruction begins promptly at 8:30 am and will go through 5:00pm

Place: Elkhorn Slough National Estuarine Research Reserve 1700 Elkhorn Road, Watsonville, CA 95076 (831) 728-2822

Cost: $50.00 ea. (There will be an additional fee to receive CEU’s through California State University Monterey Bay. Limited scholarships available.)

For more information call Tricia Wilson or George Merilatt at: (831) 728-2822.