Riverside Elementary is uniquely situated for this venture because it is located near Loggers Creek and the Boise River. As we raise the fish, observe their life stages and growth progress in the classroom aquarium, we hope to concurrently connect to our beautiful streamside outdoor classroom. We want to come to an understanding of what natural components are important if we are to have creatures such as trout survive in the wild. We will learn some basic fish biology and what environmental features are necessary for trout to live. If we're lucky, I hope we can eventually release our young trout to live in the Boise River.

This truly will be a great experiment for all of us. We hope to have the aquarium up and running soon. I will need help in moving forward with this special educational opportunity. My husband and the local Ted Trueblood Chapter of TU will be assisting me. We will seek the help of professional fishery biologists to give us guidance and occasional classroom and field trip instruction. There can be direct involvement by the students in the daily and routine caring of the fish. We may need to have some fund raising to purchase fish food and necessary equipment. This sort of thing has been done elsewhere, but there aren't many examples to guide our efforts. We will try to network with others that are doing similar undertakings. We could experience some failures along the way, but as with life in general, we will try to learn by our mistakes.

I hope our "trout in the classroom" experiment will help each of my students to become more caring of the environment and foster a life long respect and wonder for nature. We thank TU and others for this great opportunity.
Carrie Prange
Teacher, 4B
Riverside Elementary