Integrated Pest Management:
A curriculum module
for high school science classes
Welcome educators, students, parents and friends!
In 2006, North Carolina adopted the School Children's Health Act, a law that requires all public school districts in our state to use Integrated Pest Management, or IPM, by the year 2011. IPM is a prevention-based approach to pest management that drastically reduces the risk for student and staff exposure to pesticides at school.
This IPM curriculum module was designed to help students explore environmental health and pest management in their real life, every day environments. It has built in opportunities for students to improve pest management practices in their own homes, schools, and communities.
It was developed and piloted with a ninth grade biology class, and can be easily tailored for use in biology and environmental science classes across high school and upper middle school grades. It directly addresses several competency objectives under the NC Standard Course of Study for Biology, including 3.05, 4.03, 4.04 and 5.03, and can also be easily customized to address objectives 2.04, 4.01, 4.02, 4.05 or 5.01.
We designed this module according to the following principles:
- Teacher choice – We present the module as a menu so you can choose among options to create the best fit for your students.
- Student choice – At the end of the module, students can continue to explore the topics that most captivate them.
- Inquiry-based, collaborative learning – You can act as a resource while students work in small groups to conduct local investigations and Internet research.