Improved Fisheries

• This article highlights the carbon reduction possible by changing commercial fisheries' practices to reduce overfishing, protect the seabed from trawling, and allow depleted fish stocks to recover.
• Students will learn about the importance of allowing depleted fish populations to recover to sustainable levels (from an economic and carbon storage perspective), protecting the carbon stored in the seabed, and the resulting ability of fishing boats to travel shorter distances and spend less time fishing.

Positives

• This article is presented as a scientific paper which can make it beneficial in both science and language arts classes as practice in reading technical texts.
• The "What You Can Do" section provides succinct, practical ways that students can take action to be a part of this climate solution.

Additional Prerequisites

• Students should have background knowledge on concepts related to fisheries and overfishing, so consider watching this short video on the state of fish populations or something similar prior to using this resource.
• A basic familiarity with the units of measurement used in the article, gigatons or metric tons, will help with comprehension.

Differentiation

• Provide students with a note-taking guide that directs them to summarize concepts, such as methodology and economic considerations, in order to organize significant findings while reading.
• Enhance students' understanding of climate solutions by allowing them to view these Climate 101 videos that provide background information on how to start enacting solutions to climate change.
• Consider pre-teaching new vocabulary prior to reading the article, allowing students to focus on comprehending big ideas in the text.
• Have students research their own governments' policies that might promote overfishing and propose a plan for how to change these policies if necessary.
• Social studies classes can research the negative impacts of commercial fishing on Indigenous populations, subsistence fishers, and small-scale fishers.  Identify if these measures to limit commercial fishing would also have additional benefits for these populations.
• Science classes can use this article to connect to lessons about carrying capacity, sustainable harvests, carbon storage and the slow carbon cycle, trophic cascades, or the sixth mass extinction.

This resource addresses the listed standards. To fully meet standards, search for more related resources.