‘Dr Living Sound’ Inspires Students To Keep Long Island Sound Alive

By Larissa Lytwyn

While Connecticut families have long enjoyed the lively waters of Long Island Sound, accessibility has been limited in recent years due to the state’s ongoing battle with pollution.

Until recently, tri-state area sewage treatment plants occasionally filtered an overflow of untreated sewage into the sound. Other pollutants, from automotive fumes to toxic fertilizers to litter, has further damaged the sound’s sensitive and varied habitat.

During his recent, first-time visit to Sandy Hook School’s third and fourth grade classes, Dr Living Sound (Jim Paul) and his assistant Detective Drip (Elizabeth Williams), both educators at the Maritime Aquarium in Norwalk, taught students how to conserve our all-too-precious resources.

“This presentation is ideal because it reflects what the students are covering in class,” noted third grade teacher Amy Taylor.

Parent volunteer Betsy Gaier, a member of the district’s Cultural Arts Committee, said Dr Living Sound’s visit also coincided with Earth Day, coming on April 22.

“He really focuses on how valuable our resources are,” she noted, recalling his discussion of horseshoe crab’s blood.

“He said that there is a special chemical in [horseshoe blood] that is valuable in research,” she said. “This important substance is only found in the horseshoe crab.”

Recently, she continued, the once widespread crustacean has been threatened with endangerment.

Dr Living Sound also discussed how a water molecule is composed of hydrogen and oxygen, using student volunteers to create a three-dimension model of the famed “Mickey Mouse” atom.

“Guess how many molecules it takes to form one drop of water,” Dr Living Sound challenged the students.

One child said a thousand. Someone else called out a million.

“One trillion molecules,” Dr Living Sound answered, to awed exclamations of surprise.

“The topics that Dr Living Sound discusses, like water, are ones that are accessible to the students,” said Ms Gaier.

Dr Living Sound continued to expound on the properties of water, including the ratio between fresh and salt water supplies.

To demonstrate, he contrasted a large container of water with a much smaller one.

“Only three percent of our water supply is fresh,” said Dr Living Sound. Further, much of the world’s fresh water is frozen in glaciers and icebergs — places that are very difficult to access.

Dr Living Sound showed students how limited the fresh water supply was by having a student volunteer hold up one tablespoon of water. “That’s all we have right now,” he said. “That is all we can access.”

Breaking down the glaciers, he continued, would be very physically demanding and costly.

He and Detective Drip, whose “job” was to find “leaks,” asked students to name ways they could conserve water.

Answers included taking shorter showers, turning off the faucet in between tooth brushing, organizing trash cleanups, getting involved in efforts to conserve wetlands, and refraining from littering.

Dr Living Sound also said that fertilizers were not usually needed to care for gardens. “You can actually purchase a kit for five dollars at Home Depot that can determine whether or not you need to use fertilizer,” he said, urging students to inform their families about them.

Families could also substitute chemical fertilizers with all-organic ones.

Third grader Patrick Haggerty said he appreciated Dr Living Sound’s visit. “It [reinforced] what we have been learning in class,” he said, “things like the water cycle and pollution.”

He added that he had been sick recently and the presentation had helped him learn a lot of new things.

“I feel like I caught up a little,” he said.

Another third grader, Andy Gaier, said that he found it interesting that although the earth is largely covered with water, only a very small part of it is available for human consumption.

“I thought [the presentation] was interesting,” he said.

Clare Maurer agreed. “I liked it,” she said. “I didn’t know that we have as little fresh water as we do! That’s scary!”

For more information on the Dr Living Sound program, visit the Maritime Aquarium website at www.maritimeaquarium.org or call 203-852-2206.