Resources:

Download "How to raise Virginia Trout"

Links:

• TIC Coordinators
• TIC Teachers
• TIC Teacher Web sites
• Photos of Trout Stages

Teaching aids:

• Science Lesson Plans and Activity Ideas
• The Nitrogen Cycle
• TIC Teacher packet
• Trout ID
• Trout stages in pictures
• Trout tank data sheet

CSI Info:

• CSI fact sheet
• CSI user guide

Macroinvertebrates module

• Bioassessment plan
• Introduction to macroinvertebrates and metrics
• Bug ID cheat sheet
• Field sheets
• Habitat field guide
• Modified bug ID card
• Revised habitat form

Teaching aids part 1 (unzip to view contents)

Teaching aids part 2 (unzip to view contents)

For lesson plans,
please visit the Troutintheclassroom.org website.

Additional educational resources here: http://www.grandcaverns.org/students.html

Trout in the Classroom (TIC) is a conservation-oriented environmental education program for elementary, middle, and high school students.  During the year each teacher tailors the program to fit his or her curricular needs.  Therefore, each TIC program is unique.  TIC has interdisciplinary applications in science, social studies, mathematics, language arts, fine arts, and physical education. 

 

In the program, students and teachers raise trout from fertilized eggs supplied by VGIF hatcheries, in aquariums equipped with special chillers designed to keep the water near 50 degrees F.  The students make daily temperature measurements, and monitor pH and ammonia levels with test kits.  They record their data, plot trends, and make sure that the water quality is sufficient to support trout development.  The fingerlings, which hatch in late October, are almost an inch and a half long by mid-January.  And towards the end of the school year, students will release the fry into VGIF approved watersheds.

 

TIC programs have been in place all across the country for more than 20 years, and are the result of numerous collaborations between teachers, volunteers, government agencies, and local organizations like Trout Unlimited.  The programs were designed specifically for teachers who wanted to incorporate more environmental education into their curriculum. 

 

While the immediate goal of Trout in the Classroom is to increase student knowledge of water quality and coldwater conservation, its long-term goal is to reconnect an increasingly urbanized population of youth to the system of streams, rivers, and watersheds that sustain them.  Successful programs have helped:

o       connect students to their local environments and their local watersheds;

o       teach about watershed health and water quality, and;

o       get students to care about fish and the environment.

 

In Virginia, the TIC program is now in its fifth year.  Over this summer, the program experienced an amazing growth spurt.   Thanks to AEP and Dominion grants and chapter fund raising efforts, we now have 128 classrooms throughout the state, ranging from elementary school through high school - up from 65 last year.  This year, over 44,000 students will experience a hands-on cold water conservation program.  In these 128 schools, 74% are raising brook trout (Virginia's state fish), 23% of the schools are raising brown trout, and 3% are raising Rainbow trout - all from eggs provided by hatcheries run by the Virginia Department of Game and Inland Fisheries.  New programs this year have started in Marion, Quantico Marine Base, Virginia Beach, Charlottesville, Norton area, Arlington, Reston, Hampton, Powatan County, the Claytor Nature Center, and the Shenandoah Valley Discovery Museum.

 

For more information about participating in the Trout in the Classroom program in Virginia, please contact:

 

Richard Landreth

Vice President for Education/Outreach, Virginia Council of Trout Unlimited

Virginia Regional TIC Coordinator

144 VA Institute Way

Swoope, VA  24479    
landrethcats@aol.com