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Basic PEWI Exercises

These "Basic PEWI Exercises" contains outlines for five short activities intended to introduce undergraduate students to the following ecological concepts:

  • Ecological Functions
  • Ecological Functions and Conservation Practices
  • Targeting
  • Inter-annual Variability
  • and Land-use Tradeoffs

Download Basic PEWI Exercises.pdf (278 KB)

This PowerPoint presentation may helpful in introducing PEWI: PEWIIntroduction_supportingpresentation.pptx (12 MB)

Net Social Value Analysis

This set of combined lecture and lab materials is designed to help undergraduate and graduate students conduct a net social value analysis associated with different land uses. By the end of the lesson students will be more familiar with how to determine the financial viability of a watershed scale land-use plan. The materials could be modified for use with adult learners.

Download the exercise: PEWI Net Social Value Analysis.docx (16 KB)

Download the supporting lecture: Cost Assessment Slides.pptx (11 MB)

This PowerPoint presentation can be used to introduce PEWI: PEWIIntroduction_supportingpresentation.pptx (12 MB)

Share Your Lesson Plans

Our primary objective is to to help people understand ecological, social, and economic issues related to ecosystem services, tradeoffs, and land management. We believe PEWI is a powerful tool to achieve this had hope to expand the use of PEWI with student learners in the classroom and with adult learners in stakeholder groups.   Have you created a lesson plan that you would like to share?

Effects of land use and meeting multiple human demands on agricultural landscapes

This is a 2-part lesson plan designed to be used in a 50-minute period in a middle school or high school classroom. The first exercise in this lesson plan asks students to explore the effects of three basic land-use scenarios in the PEWI watershed. After recording results, students discuss patterns, similarities, and differences among the scenarios. The second exercise in the lesson plan builds on the first exercise. Students design their own land use in the watershed to meet multiple human demands of agricultural landscapes, considering the following questions:

  • What benefits do I get from different land uses?
  • What benefits do I want agricultural watersheds to provide?
  • What land uses should go next to the stream?
  • What land uses do better in wet years? dry years?

Download Effects of land use and meeting multiple human demands.docx (26 KB)

Exercises for Engaging Agricultural Stakeholders on Watershed Issues

Audience: 

This set of exercises was designed for engaging adult learners. Parts I and IIa are introductory exercises to familiarize users with PEWI and its concepts.  Part IIb, Part III and the Homework exercises build on the introductory exercises to teach more advanced watershed and nutrient reduction concepts. The Appendix section provides suggested questions that the facilitator may choose to include in the Part III roundtable.

Download PEWI_Nutrient_Reduction_Exercises.docx. (86 KB)

We've included this base PowerPoint presentation on PEWI to use in conjunction with these exercises: PEWIStakeholderWorkshop_supportingpresentation.pptx (12 MB). Facilitators can modify this presentation to meet their specific needs.

Accounting for Ecosystem Services and Tradeoffs in Land Use Planning with PEWI

This lesson plan asks students to imagine themselves as a city planning commission tasked with developing a land-use plan with specific ecosystem services in mind.  The lesson includes two short exercises that utilize PEWI and recommended discussion questions that help students understand ecosystem services tradeoffs. This lesson has been successfully used with undergraduate and graduate students, and could be adapted for use with adult learners.

Download Land-use Planning Exercise.docx (16 KB).  

Ecosystem Services Lab

The Ecosystem Services Lab outlines three exercises that utilize PEWI within an undergraduate classroom to teach students about Ecological Functions and Targeting and Tradeoffs. The third lesson allows to students to design their ideal watershed.  Lesson outlines also contain suggestions for how to modify exercises for graduate students.

Download the Ecosystem Services Lab.docx (23 KB)

The Future of Food, Energy, and Water

The following lesson plans are designed as a group project.  In the first lesson, students will learn how to use PEWI and establish goals for how to manage food, energy, and water resources within their watersheds.  A follow up lesson teaches students to design a landscape according to the objectives set forth in the first part. This lesson has been successfully used with middle school and high school students.

Download Lesson 1: The Future of Food Energy and Water_Team Project Part 1.docx (61 KB)

Download Lesson 2: The Future of Food Energy and Water_Team Project Part 2.docx (59 KB)

Landscape Design Group Project

This document outlines a group project wherein undergraduate or graduate students use PEWI to create and compare four landscape designs. Students are asked to submit a detailed project report discussing multifunctional benefits within their designs and how their land-use scenarios may be viewed by diverse stakeholder groups. To provide background and a theoretical foundation, the project utilizes Atwell, R. C., L. A. Schulte, and L. M. Westphal. 2011. Tweak, Adapt, or Transform: Policy Scenarios in Response to Emerging Bioenergy Markets in the US Corn Belt. Ecology and Society 16. 

Download Landscape Design Group Project.pdf (569 KB)

The associated Atwell et al. publication is freely available directly from the journal Ecology and Society here