The Acadiana Park Nature Station is hosting Earth Day Acadiana again in 2000. We will be celebrating this event at Bayou Vermilion District (next to Vermilionville) on the Spring Equinox with food, music, activities, and environmental information. We are involved with the Earth Day Groceries Project to provide a way for all Acadiana school children to participate in Earth Day Acadiana. The Earth Day Groceries Project is an activity that promotes environmental awareness in a school and its community. It is a free activity that hundreds of schools around the world will be involved in. The basic idea is this: a school obtains large paper grocery bags from a local grocery store, students at the school decorate the bags with colorful environmental messages, the bags are returned to the store, and the store hands them out (filled with groceries) to shoppers on Earth Day.

There is a World Wide Web site coordinating this project. The Earth Day Groceries Project is one of the oldest and largest educational activities on the Internet. The web site is non profit, and is hosted by Arbor Heights Elementary School in Seattle Washington. The last piece of a school's participation is for someone at the school to call or e-mail in a report to Stacey at the Acadiana Park Nature Station (291-8448) or e-mail. Then that school's report will be listed on the Nature Station’s web site along with other Acadiana schools as well as on the Earth Day Groceries World Wide Web site along with hundreds of other schools who have participated. This year, 2000, is the seventh year this project has been coordinated on the Internet. Every report, from high schools to kindergarten classes is archived at the web site, from 1994 through 1997. There are also pictures from many schools showing some of their students involved in the project.

The Acadiana Park Nature Station web site address is http://www.naturestation.org, and the Internet project coordinator is Stacey Scarce - Please feel free to visit the web site or e-mail for more information. The Earth Day Groceries Project web site address is: http://www.earthdaybags.org, and the Internet project coordinator is Mark Ahlness: mahlness@cks.ssd.k12.wa.us - Please feel free to visit the web site or email for more information. We hope your school can participate in 2000! Happy Earth Day!

Have students decorate the bags with pictures of the earth, environmental messages, the name of your school, etc. Be creative!

DO NOT allow students to write their last names on any bags.

You can make sturdy templates of the earth from tagboard. The kids could trace the "earth" and color in (actually, markers are more ecologically correct than crayons) the oceans and continents. You may want the name of your school to encircle the earth. It may be helpful to have small groups of students distribute the bags and do a brief demonstration in each classroom. When the bags are collected, you may have some decisions to make regarding spelling accuracy and how that might reflect on your school. You may want to have a paper bag contest, the best artwork, best original environmental message or any other type of contest. The Nature Station will include the contest winners first name, the teachers name, the grade, and the school’s name on their Earth Day Acadiana page on the Nature Station web site. E-mail or call Stacey at the Nature Station (291-8448) with statistics on how many children participated, how many bags were decorated, which grocer received the bags, and information on any contests that you may have held.

Thank You for caring enough about our home to participate in this project.

Earth Day Groceries Web Site: http://www.earthdaybags.org

Earth Day Groceries Project Worldwide Facts & Figures:

1999 EDGP statistics - 1,105 Schools 367,466 Bags

Dear Fourth Grade Teachers,

The Acadiana Park Nature Station is hosting Earth Day Acadiana in 2000. It has hosted this event for the past two years. Earth Day Acadiana was established to provide people with tools to answers questions they have concerning the environment. This event will take place on the Spring Equinox. We will have music, food, hands on activities for children, and information booths.

We are also involved in Earth Day Groceries Project, to provide a way for all Acadiana school children to participate in Earth Day Acadiana. The Earth Day Groceries Project is an activity that promotes environmental awareness in a school and its community. It is a free activity that hundreds of schools around the world will be involved in on Earth Day, April 22, 1999 (Earth Day Acadiana is held near 19 or 20 March, on the Spring Equinox. The basic idea is this: a school obtains large paper grocery bags from a local grocery store, students at the school decorate the bags with colorful environmental messages, the bags are returned to the store, and the store hands them out (filled with groceries) to shoppers on Earth Day.

There is a World Wide Web site coordinating this project. The Earth Day Groceries Project is one of the oldest and largest educational activities on the Internet. The web site is non profit, and is hosted by Arbor Heights Elementary School in Seattle Washington. The last piece of a school's participation is for someone at the school to call or email in a report to Stacey at the Acadiana Park Nature Station (291-8448) or stascarce@naturestation.org. Then that school's report will be listed on the Nature Station’s web site along with other Acadiana schools as well as on the Earth Day Groceries World Wide Web site http://www.earthdaybags.org along with hundreds of other schools who have participated world wide. This year, 2000, is the sixth year this project has been coordinated on the Internet. Every report, from high schools to kindergarten classes is archived at the web site, from 1994 through 1997.

We hope you will consider this project for your students to provide them with the means to question the condition of our environment.

For any further information, contact Stacey at the Acadiana Park Nature Station by e-mail or at (318) 291-8448.

Thank you for your consideration of this project.

Sincerely,

Stacey L. Scarce