Students will explore four ocean cycles while they dress a puffin in its breeding plumage, take a trip with a gray whale, get to know members of a kelp forest food cycle and explore the stages of an ocean animal's life cycle. Student volunteers are transformed into fishes, birds and marine mammals as the group learns why these animals come in so many sizes, shapes and colors. Using costumes, bones, pelts, teeth and baleen, students get to know some of the mammals that thrive off the Northwest coast and how they are adapted for survival. In the midst of pounding waves and changing tides, life flourishes on Oregon's rocky shores. Students will put on striking marine invertebrate costumes and learn about adaptations for survival in this harsh environment.
Oil spills are only the beginning when it comes to marine disasters.
Through hands-on activities, students will understand how human action causes pollution and how it affects marine animals. Through close-up animal observation, students take a look at the complexities of marine food webs and see what happens when humans join the web. Focusing on sea otters, seals, sea lions and whales, students will examine fur, blubber, bones and teeth and learn how marine mammals' are adapted for life at sea. By comparing animal adaptations to human tools, students will learn some of the ways that marine mammals, birds, fishes and invertebrates are adapted to their environment. In this interactive theater program, students will explore the roles myth and science have played in shaping our view of the marine environment.