Teachers set sail for STEM
This weekend, April 22-23, 2023 I did the most incredible adventure. First I set off after work on the Amtrak to Bellingham. It was fun and right on the water at times. I saw an eagle swoop into the water and catch a fish and deer in the water as well. I arrived at about 10 p.m. and the Uber was not available (I later found out they were having a fight with the port so they didn’t pick up at all), the taxi, located on site didn’t have any taxis due to personnel problems. Finally I got a Lyft and got my ride to Bellihgham Lodge.
I joined about 18 other Washington state teachers aboard the Schooner Zodiac — a 100-year-old historic sailboat — and we sailed the Salish Sea, Bellingham Bay and around Bellingham, the San Juans and outside of Anacortes. My maternal family is from Anacortes, and I had lived in the area prior, so it was a bit like coming home. It was amazing. It was incredible. We started onto the boat loading all of our gear onto the boat while the ship crew — volunteers and a captain met us. We settled in to our bunks which were very small and tight but truly, we were so exhausted by the day, they slept just fine. I had to stand on the person below’s bunk to get to my top bunk. We met on board.
Our call was “all hands” — and we responded “on deck.” I’m not sure the exact order of what we did but we soon had lunch and it was amazing. It was a coconut sweet potato soup with fresh made naan. We were assigned a bunk number - mine was 18 - and that corresponded to our mug on a hook above the galley (kitchen).
We then started off and sailed a bit. We saw a gray whale, a humpback whale, a minke whale, porpoises, and my favorite bird, cormorants. We put up the 4,000 pound sail all together as a team. We got to our work stations and got to work. We arranged the rope (it was heavy too!) and later we put up the sail. It was beautiful and took a lot of work.
The Schooner Zodiac is a beautiful ship, 160 feet long working tall ship and they do day, evening and week long tours in the summer.
A bit later we met to talk about STEM projects, hands on learning and to set an objective for our learning. A bit later than that we began our two projects. We had decided we wanted to focus on Ph and plankton. Plankton was my favorite in a similar marine science program, Blue Water Marine Lab at home when I was in high school in Hawaii. We got our plankton net and cod end and pulled up some samples. Then we dropped the plankton net to a depth of 10 feet, three times to get our sample and pulled it up to look under the microscopes. This was my favorite part, I could have done it all day. I drew pictures of the zoo and phyto plankton.
They had cool jobs set up — I was safety officer, there was also gear minions, chief scientist and communications officer — essentials for students in groups as well. Then we did our STEM work (STEM stands for science, technology, engineering and math and sometimes they add A for art to make STEAM), which was using supplies to create a plankton trap that we would leave overnight, hanging from the ship. Our supplies were a large plastic water bottle, with a whole cut at the middle, a funnel, the cod end, a working flashlight, a float, duct tape and 6 zip ties. We did a test to make sure it worked and then set it in the water. One group did a flashing light like the disco. They caught the most stuff!
Our goal was to get the megalops juvenile dungeness crab, and we caught one that we could see. It was about 2 milimeters by the naked eye but so big under the microscope and so active! It was darting all around and wiggling.
Later we had afternoon snack, a full chartucerie board — which was amazing. Dinner was orzo, green beans and chicken breasts, followed by a homemade chocolate pudding with fresh whipped whip cream with orange zest. The chef, Caz was simply amazing and so skilled at her work. We hung out for a bit, I had some tea while watching the sea, and then we were told ship lights went off at 11, but the meal bell would be rung at 7 a.m.
We docked at Deep Bay outside of Anacortes and Cypress Island near Guemes.
I headed to bed, read for a bit and went to sleep in my sleeping bag in my bunk. It was very cozy. I felt like I got no sleep but my roommate, Adrienne from Tumwater School District online program told me that I did. I climbed down and got dressed and went to breakfast. It was English breakfast with baked tomatoes, mushrooms, toast, sausage, bacon and baked beans. We could have coffee, tea, cocoa or fruit at any time.
Then we got ready and started our journey back to Bellingham. While still anchored we continued our testing. We pulled up our plankton traps, and looked at the stuff we found under the microscope — we were given plankton identification sheets and I loved the drawing part. Then I was dragged away from the microscope and went to do the ph and water testing station — we tested salinity, ph and dissolved oxygen.
Then we headed underway. It was quite windy so we only took the sail up half way. It took everyone on crew to help. This day it was not quite so hard as the day before. Another teacher and I pulled one of the sail ropes down and it took so much pulling. We were divided half and half down the ship directed by the crew.
The entire trip we had ship jobs. One was the chart station where you learned about navigation. A volunteer said you could either have the history version or straight navigation, as each session was 15 minutes. In my history lesson, I learned about the Chinese and the Iberians and the Arabs and their role in navigation and development of cartography. I found via my DNA test that I am Iberian (11 percent from Spain and Portugal) and have a little bit of Middle Eastern (4 percent), so I found that especially interesting. Additionally, they had a wood tool from the Marshall Islands and I have quite a few students from there, so I thought they would be excited to see it.
Then I did my second job which was steering the ship. I didn’t get to be the lookout — which was the task I was hoping for, but I did in fact steer the ship back to dock, so that was pretty neat.
We returned, unloaded, said our many thanks, had a closing circle and heading out.
What an incredibly amazing experience it was, plus `12 STEM credits for teachers. They have day sails and overnight and even volunteer opportunities to live aboard ship in the summer.
