Online Learning Resources
Explore virtual field trips, activities, worksheets, and community science projects for PreK-12 to bring the Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary into your home.
DIVE: An Inspiring Journey Through California’s Marine Protected Areas
Middle School
All materials, including videos in Spanish and Portuguese, can be found here.
Click here for the Dive trailer
Click here for the 360º video
Click here to access the lesson plan and class materials
Save Our Shores, Virtual Planet Technologies, and Oceans360 have teamed up to create a virtual reality experience of our region’s Marine Protected Areas to offer middle school students a glimpse of these magnificent underwater treasures and learn why they are vital to the health of our oceans and a healthy future of all life on Earth.
In the VR experience students join an animated sea lion named Marina on a fun and educational journey in a Save Our Shores submarine observing and interacting with various species in Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) along the Central California and Southern California coastlines. You can try this immersive experience using an Oculus Quest headset, or on Vimeo 360º in the links below. Contact us to schedule this lesson with your students, or utilize the resources and lesson plan below to engage your students or children in the content.
Where do I live?
Grades: PreK to 3
Explore three of the amazing ecosystems we have here in the Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary and some of the animals that live in each! Print these images of habitats and animals that are found right here in our ocean backyard, and have students match where each animal lives. Questions for students to consider: Why does it live there? What does it need to survive? How does it protect itself?
Virtual tidepool exploration and book reading
Grades: PreK to 5
Join Save Our Shores for an exploration of our rocky intertidal zones at Natural Bridges State Marine Reserve.
This activity begins with a reading of the book “In One Tidepool: Crabs, Snails, and Salty Tails” by Anthony D. Fredericks, followed by an exploration of the intertidal zones and some of the animals that call this dynamic ecosystem home.
4R Bingo
Grades: K to 6
Refuse, Reduce, Reuse, & Recycle!
Take action to make change at home while playing SOS 4R BINGO! This game is bilingual and includes instructions to enhance play.
Birds in your backyard
Grades: 1 to 5
The great thing about studying birds is they can be found anywhere! Students can explore bird structures and functions with this worksheet, watch shore birds real time with the Monterey Bay Aquarium Live Cam, and become a bird watcher in their own backyard! Students can use these tips for bird watching at home and spend time making observations and drawings in a nature journal or science notebook.
Virtual beach cleanup field trip
Grades: 2 to 6
Join Save Our Shores Education Coordinator, Krista Rogers, for a fun and educational exploration of Manresa Beach.
Students will get an introduction on human impacts to the sandy beach habitat, and think of ways they can help prevent ocean pollution.
Watch the video while following along with this worksheet and student data card.
Where Does the Flow Go?
Grades: 2 to 6
Giant Kelp structure & function
Grades: 3 to 5
Explore the structures of Giant Kelp, and their corresponding functions with this worksheet. Find out how this seaweed survives in our dynamic ocean and how it is the foundation of one of our amazing ecosystems: the kelp forest!
50 years of earth day
Grades: 6 to 12
Watershed Trivia
Download the PowerPoint from our Watershed Trivia Night to hold your own Watershed Trivia event to test your friends’, family’s, or class’s knowledge of our region’s watersheds!
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Photo Credit: Jon Anderson, Pacific Sea Nettles, Waves & Wildlife 2019