Half day field program
What it actually looks like
What the children do
A field-based outdoor program of 1.5 to 2 hours, taught by certified educators at sites around Tofino and Ucluelet, for a flat rate of $300 per group. Topics on offer include intertidal ecology, rainforest ecology, oceanography and plankton ecology, invertebrate diversity, avian ecology and mudflat ecology, and the educators build the session around the age and interests of the group. Teaching is tailored to the grade level. Several topics can only run at low tide, and the beach seine also depends on equipment and location, so the date and time you ask for may have to move. Mudflat tours are based at Tofino Botanical Gardens. For avian ecology the site asks groups to bring their own binoculars.
Go out with an educator to a rocky shore, a mudflat or a rainforest and look closely at what lives there. Depending on the topic they search tide pools at low tide, help pull a beach seine through the shallows and look at plankton under a microscope, or walk and watch for songbirds, seabirds and shorebirds with binoculars they bring themselves.
Good to know
You get a certified educator, a flat group rate and a choice of coastal topics. Where you meet, washrooms, lunch, a rain backup, bus parking, how many adults have to come and the youngest age are all unstated, so it is worth an email before you book a bus.