Explore this story to find out about the celestial sphere and the star compass. Discover how to navigate by stars, the Moon, the Sun, ocean swells and bird life. Read about waka hourua – the double-hulled canoes used for such voyages – and about the waka revival in New Zealand.
This classroom activity package is made available courtesy of NOAA, Oikonos, and other partners. Albatrosses, charismatic and threatened seabirds, are ambassadors for a clean ocean because they traverse vast oceanic regions searching for floating food. Along their journeys, they ingest plastic trash and feed it to their chicks. These five lessons comprise new and modified activities, using inquiry-based science instruction, aligned to new standards for grades 6 – 8 with extensions for grades 9 – 12.