Section one of this guide provides fun pre-visit activities that will increase the students' knowledge about adaptations, habitats, communities, and Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore. All the materials for this section are provided for you to photocopy.

We want you to feel comfortable leading your students on the West Beach Succession Trail. Section two has background information about the plant and animal communities that you will visit. This is the same information a new park ranger receives to guide this hike. The only things you need for your park visit are 4 by 6 index cards, a bus, and to arrange a fee waiver to West Beach. Call the scheduling office at (219)-926-7561 Ext 243 or 245 at least three weeks prior to your visit so a fee waiver can be mailed to you. If you want to be better prepared to teach succession, we recommend reading Dune Country by Glenda Daniel. It is sold at the Kemil Road Visitor Center.

People love the Indiana Dunes. The park rangers are trying to balance letting people visit the dunes and also preserving them unimpaired for future generations. Section three introduces the students to some critical resource issues for which rangers and scientist are trying to find solutions. Your students will need to use critical thinking to suggest solutions to some of the threats to the park that are presented in the post-visit section. They will also learn that many problems do not have a solution and it will be difficult to pass this park on to future generations unimpaired. You need a photocopier and 150 tokens to do all the activities in section three.

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