Explorer Classroom E8

E8 had a very productive second half of the school year! After completing the National Geographic zoom sessions with five very interesting scientists last fall, Explorer Classroom E8's next mission was to adopt a local natural area and complete a conservation task. There are several beautiful natural places right near Lexington School for the Deaf. We decided to adopt a bat habitat in Forest Park, Queens. Our local bats need our protection, and we committed ourselves to doing just that.

To that end, we met with the Forest Park park rangers and the Gotham Bat Conservancy conservationists to learn all about the bats and the bat habitat in Forest Park. We felt very lucky to have such friendly and knowledgeable people to teach us about the natural world around us here in New York City.

Enjoy our second and final newsletter!

Back in February, Ryan Mahoney and Roxanne Quilty came to our classroom to teach both E7 and E8 all about the bats in Forest Park. They are directors and conservationists from the Gotham Bat Conservancy. We learned that nine different species of bats have been detected at the park in the Strack Pond area. Ryan and Roxanne showed us a special device they use to help identify bats called an ultrasonic recorder. The device measures and represents the soundwaves from bat calls. Bats can be identified by their species-specific frequency and soundwave shape. This device would be the key component of our conservation effort later in May and June.

Throughout the school year, E8 spent several class periods learning about Forest Park animals and plants. We researched different topics around bats, too. We made eight thinking maps to help us gather facts, take notes, and organize our thoughts around the nature study.

While we were doing research on why some bat species are threatened or endangered, we needed more information. We needed to know if there were more than the three reasons we found out about. We decided to contact the bat scientist in Mexico that we met during a National Geographic Explorer Classroom zoom session last fall. His name is Dr. Rodrigo Medellin. He is a bat expert.

We learned an important lesson from him. Sometimes you have to check your research and make sure the facts are accurate. For example, from one information source, winter and cold weather was mentioned as factors that threaten bat survival. While winter and cold weather can make surviving the white nose syndrome bat disease more difficult, winter cold temperatures alone are not the cause of bat population decline. Dr. Medellin explained that bats can hibernate or migrate to warmer climates to survive the winter. Thanks for helping us get our facts straight, Dr. Medellin!

We made videos to ask our bat experts the question about threats to bat populations. It was our way to communicate with them. Click on the videos to view.

We met up with our park ranger friends in Forest Park for a second nature walk in April. Ranger Burns and Ranger Roche led the walk this time. They taught us how to identify various trees in the park. We still have homework to do that was assigned by the rangers. We will take part of our summer session to identify a few of the trees he showed us. Ranger Burns gave us clues and we took photos. Sorry that our assignment is late, Rangers Burns and Roche. Thanks for sharing your knowledge with us!

In May, E7 and E8 met up with conservationist, Ryan Mahoney, at Strack Pond in Forest Park. One of our goals for that field trip was to find out more about the Strack Pond bat habitat. Our other goal was to learn about how we could help protect bats. We became "Junior Conservationists" on that day!

Ryan gave us a leaflet that helped us to identify trees that bats like and depend on. We also saw where Ryan had placed the ultrasonic recorder up in a tree next to the pond. That recorder gave us soundwave data right there in the park! Ryan showed us the recordings of bat calls and explained what could be learned from the data.

He then assigned us the conservationist task to analyze the data, identify the bat species present, and report the findings to the Gotham Bat App.

On June 9th, we went on a special field trip to the Bronx Zoo. For the first time, we were able to see real bats up close. It was very dark and scary in the bat exhibit, but we loved it. Sooooo cool!🦇

At the end of June, Ryan and Roxanne from the Gotham Bat Conservancy met with us on Zoom. The goal of this meeting was to analyze the bat call soundwave recordings from Strack Pond and identify the species present. Ryan and Roxanne provided us with the criteria for analyzing the recordings. With their guidance, we were able to successfully identify two bat species: the Big Brown Bat and the Tricolor Bat. The last step was to upload the Strack Pond bat data to the Gotham Bat app.

Thanks, Ryan and Roxanne, for helping us to become Junior Bat Conservationists!🦇

The two Gotham Bat Conservancy workshops and the bat conservation zoom session were made possible through a generous donation from Ms. Julia Kramer. We hope you enjoyed reading our newsletter and seeing the results of your generosity, Ms. Kramer. Both E7 and E8 students learned so much from this experience. Thank you!