TIMES RECORD • June 12, 2025
Brunswick School Department elementary students are getting a hands-on look at local ecosystems with a new curriculum designed by their own teachers, along with educators from the Brunswick-Topsham Land Trust. Kate Furbish and Harriet Beecher Stowe Elementary Schools rolled out the new units in K-5 classrooms throughout the school year. Kids are doing “big, messy experiments” — as fifth grade HBS teacher Kate Kovach describes — digging in the garden, hunting for decomposers in the woods, tracking the sun’s path and more. Lesson plans were designed over two years by BTLT’s Cathance River Education Alliance and a team of BSD teachers to align with guidelines in the recently adopted Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS) — which focus on actually doing science, rather than memorization.