Center for Marine Biodiversity and Conservation

The United Nations has declared 2021-2030 the Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development; increasing ocean literacy is an integral part of the larger network of actions intended to address the numerous environmental crises the global ocean faces. Many aspects of Ocean science remain opaque to the public, including the world of planktonic organisms. The arts provide an expansive laboratory for communicating and interacting with scientific topics, including in modes that engage visual and kinesthetic learners. I designed an interactive art

installation and STEAM lesson plan for elementary students, with the intention of creating a somatic mode to engage with complex topics in biological oceanography. The topic was biological-physical interactions with plankton, with a focus on turbulence, based on the research of Scripps Institution of Oceanography Professor Peter Franks. Prototypes of the art installation “Plankterception” were exhibited at two events at the Birch Aquarium, where the public interacted with the work and engaged with the scientific material through conversations with me and accessing an informative website. The lesson plan was distributed to elementary school teachers in the San Diego Unified School District as a resource to celebrate World Oceans Day, using drawing and dance as a tool to think critically about plankton physiology.

See website created for this project here: https://www.plankterception.com/