The Center for Teaching and Learning's fifth through eighth graders continued their year-long field studies, helping New England scientists find inter-tidal invasive species.

On their sixth fieldwork trip, teacher Glenn Powers took his students to Hendrick's Head Beach on Southport to look for green crab, red algae, common periwinkle, and sea potato. Using a protocol developed by the Gulf of Maine Research Institute, CTL’s young scientists used line transects to take a sample of invasives along the beach, and took some samples back to school to examine under the microscope for proper identification.

They have found massive populations of common periwinkle, many green crabs, and the red algae Heterosiphonia japonica at Reid State Park and Harpswell’s Pott’s Point. The fifth through eighth graders will continue to study their data throughout the winter and will add Herring Gut in Port Clyde to their survey sites in the spring.

The Center for Teaching and Learning is an independent, K-8 demonstration school located in Edgecomb. For more information, visit the school’s website at http://www.c-t-l.org or follow us on Facebook at www.facebook.com/ctlkto8.