K-12 Education

Environmental Education Activities

Connect students to the environment through outdoor education activities the make learning fun and healthy

We've handpicked the best toolkits, guides, and outdoor education activities from NEEF and beyond. For even more high-quality educator resources, visit out Environmental Education Resources page.

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Activity Guides and Group Games

Discover fun and engaging ways to teach environmental concepts with our activity guides and group games for all ages.

Young child outdoors with paper bionoculars looking up

Outdoor Education

Environmental Education Group Games and Activities

A collection of fun, active, and engaging games to help children of all ages learn about the environment.

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Watershed Sleuth Challenge

In this Watershed Sleuth Challenge, you will learn more about your watershed—what it is, why it’s important...

At-Home Upcycle Projects

Celebrate environmental education with these easy upcycle projects.

SunWise

NEEF's SunWise program is a free environmental and health education program that teaches K-8 children about...

Apps for Environmental Education and Outdoor Activity

Are you looking for more ways to incorporate technology into your classroom? How about apps that can help you...

Learn About the Environment

Endangered Species

Going, Going... Gone?

a California Condor seated on the edge of a cliff with mountains in the background

Students learn about extinct and endangered species. They explore how climate change, habitat loss, pollution, and other facts contributed to these species' population loss. From our friends at the American Museum of Natural History.

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Sounds of Nature

Earth.fm Soundscapes

a gibbon calls from sitting on top of a tree branch

This site lets you listen to nature sounds from all over the world, gathered from contributors in places like Brazil, Spain, Thailand, New Zealand, and many more. Put a sound to the places you read about.

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Bird Academy

What Makes Birds Unique?

Find out what sets birds apart from all other living creatures with this interactive tutorial and unique activity from The Cornell Lab of Ornithology. Learn the science behind this amazing part of bird anatomy.

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Nature Lab

Urban Trees Lesson

a city park with a path surrounded by trees

In this Urban Trees lesson, presented by The Nature Conservancy, students in grades 6-8 can learn how trees renew our air supply by absorbing carbon dioxide and producing oxygen, and how they clean our air by filtering out dust and greenhouse gases.

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Imagine you discovered an animal that scientists have long thought to be extinct! And this animal, the flying frog, needs protection. This is your chance to draw and write a story about a make-believe endangered species. From our friends at the American Museum of Natural History.

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Environmental Impact Activities

Energy Consumption

Learn About Energy in Your Home

an electrical outlet power cord full with plugs

This guide offers some creative ways to help kids understand the concept of energy, including a fun home energy audit from NEEF and the National Hockey League.

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Indoor Air Quality

Improve the Environmental Quality of Your Home

a father works with his daughter to pot a plant in the living room

Use this questionnaire to help identify various factors that affect indoor air quality in your home and make fun, healthy, improvements like adding Spider plants.

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Water Use

How's My Waterway? Explore Your Water

a sink faucet running with water flowing from it

Students will learn how to use the How’s My Waterway tool to explore and visualize water quality data and determine the health of their local waterbodies.

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Energy Consumption

Saving Energy with the IMS HEROes

This incredibly creative activity challenges students to conduct a home energy audit incorporating worksheets, comic strips, and more.

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Activity Guides for Outdoor Education AT Home

a bumblebee sits on a flower collecting pollen

Protecting Pollinators

Look for a patch of flowers and watch closely to see what sort of animals visit them. Then, follow the activities on your worksheet to record your observations, monitor what types of pollinators you see, and help attract more pollinators.

People cleaning up park site in Kenilworth National Park

Community Cleanup

This quick how-to guide will get you started with everything you need to conduct a community cleanup to help out in your neighborhood or at your school.

Animal Migration

Designed for elementary-age children, this guide encourages kids to use STEM skills to explore monarch migration paths, engineer a birdfeeder, understand the phenomenon of animal migration, and use technology for citizen science.

a wetland with still shallow water reflecting green trees and grasses on the banks

Wetlands

NEEF's Wetlands Activity Guide contains information and fun projects that will teach you about wetlands—including how to make your own origami lotus!

a child holds a jar of water looking through a magnifying glass

Water Quality

Explore the topic of water quality in your area! With activities to do both on and off the worksheet, it's perfect for your next environmental investigation. You can use this activity guide at a park (remember to practice “social distancing”) or at home.

Invasive Plants

Use this activity guide to learn more about how you can identify invasive plant species in your area as well as their native, environmentally-beneficial counterparts.

Citizen Science Projects

Join the Project

Pondlife: Our Tiny Neighbors

Join microbiologist Sally Warring as she explores the giant world inside of a pond. From our friends at the American Museum of Natural History.

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Join a global community that posts about what they notice changing in the environment. Each post is synced with weather and climate data and broadcast to the community to investigate bigger picture climate trends. Over time, community members can track how climate is changing season by season and understand its impacts on daily life.

Join the Project

Environmental Education Online

Virtual Field Trips

orange jelly fish at the Monterey Bay Aquarium

Visit different exhibits at the world-renowned Monterey Bay Aquarium for a lesson in coastal wildlife.

Take A Trip

FSNatureLIVE’s offers distance learning adventures for all ages. Through a partnership with the USDA Forest Service, Prince William Network, and other sponsors, these videos were initially designed to help classrooms access remote locations and speak directly with experts as if they were really there. No matter where you are in the world, you can learn about bats, butterflies, climate change, wetlands, and more.

Take A Trip

Museum Virtual Visits

The African bush elephant in the rotunda of the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History in Washington DC.

The Smithsonian Museum of Natural History virtual tours allow visitors to take self-guided online tours of special exhibits and areas within the museum.

Make A Visit