The Hudson River Reserve helps to bring more than 5,000 New York students and teachers out into the estuary every year to develop hands-on science skills. We provide dozens of hours of educational videos, lesson plans, resources, and training to help educators connect their students with the Hudson from wherever they are.
For more information on all of our programs, please visit the DEC website, or check out our the DEC’s calendar of events.
Virtual River
The Virtual River program, supported by NYDEC and Cornell University, offers dozens of videos, lesson plans, and opportunities to connect directly with education staff, and supports engagement classrooms and the Hudson River estuary.
New content posted weekly. Topics include watersheds, tides, estuaries, and aquatic life found in the Hudson River.
Check out all the videos available on Youtube.
Day in the Life of Hudson and Harbor
Day in the Life of the Hudson and Harbor is a community education science event which brings 5,000 students and teachers to the banks of the Hudson each year. In 2020, we couldn’t safely promote a large number of field trips so we worked with over thirty partner organizations to create video resources which portray river science through the eyes of the students, who can follow along at home with data collection sheets and take a deeper dive with a guest scientist at the end of each video. The videos are divided by geography, from New York Harbor to the Troy Dam and beyond.
Data Lessons
The Hudson River Environmental Conditions Observational System (HRECOS) offers puzzles, lessons, and activities based on data actually collected on the river by HRECOS monitoring stations.
These resources help students build STEM skills by working to interpret real data like water levels, dissolved oxygen, salinity, and weather data which connects them with science happening in their own backyard.
Norrie Point
Immerse your students in the Hudson River with free field and virtual programs available at the Norrie Point Environmental Center for students 6th grade and older.
Our programs draw on real field research and provide first-hand experiences with the estuary. Students explore the Reserve’s lands and waters, and the host of life that abounds within them.
Reservations required. Contact us.
DEC Resources
The Reserve’s state partner, the New York Department of Environmental Conservation, provides an extensive resource list for caregivers, parents & educators currently engaged in remote learning.
From basic tips on Google Classrooms to printable activity pages for young children to science-based lesson plans for grades K-12, we are striving to make environmental education at home accessible and easy for New York youth.
Teachers on the Estuary
In an estuary, teachable moments are everywhere, if you know where
and how to look. The Teachers on the
Estuary Program (TOTE) gets teachers out of classroom and into
wetlands where they can explore, restore native plants, integrate art
and science topics, and develop lesson plans to take back to their
students.
Since the program’s inception, hundreds of New York educators have received hands-on experiences to support science education.