For the first time, we held an online learning course from a kelp drying bed in Hokkaido, Samani's Fuyushima district for the Himeshima Junior High School students in Oita prefecture. The village of Himeshima is also part of Oita Himeshima Geopark.

The Himeshima JH 1st graders have been learning about the branding of Himeshima Hijiki and they wanted to compare it to Hidaka Kelp. We received a request for the online learning course in order for the students to connect with a kelp fisherman. During the planning stage, however, it was then requested that we expand the topics to also include kelp harvesting and drying, Ainu place names, and peridotite, a rock found deep within the earth.

Sun dried Hidaka Kelp

This was our first attempt at such a project and it required a large amount of preparation.　We asked the geopark guides/staff and local fishermen for advice, all while testing out the broadcast connection, writing a script, planning for inclement weather, learning how to use various equipment and coming up with effective explanations.

The learning course was held on August 30th. It was broadcast from an area next to the Taisho Tunnel in Samani's Fuyushima district. It was a bit windy, as you can see from the photos, but otherwise we were blessed with fair weather.

Before holding the online course, we sent kelp and peridotite samples to the Himeshima JH students to have on hand while watching the broadcast. The students were quite surprised then they unfurled the rolled-up kelp to its normal 2-meter length.
Is this a rose!? It's just rolled-up kelp. It even included the root.

We wanted to show how kelp is harvested and dried, but were unable to do so. Kelp is only harvested during a short period of time, just 20 days out of the year. You might say you'd be lucky to actually see it happening. The ocean waves were too high for harvesting kelp on the day of the learning course. After we showed the students the drying beds and the surrounding scenery, they watched a video that introduced kelp harvesting, filmed by the Samani PR Division. The students were surprised to find that everything is done by hand and that the boats will go out to harvest and pull in kelp more than 5 times in a day.

Here is a link to the kelp fishing video. Please watch it if you are interested in how Hidaka kelp is harvested from the ocean.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Adwc9IsQmI

Kelp harvesting (July 16, 20021)

We received some commentary from the students about how it's fun to learn something that you never knew. They were also impressed that we could connect to each other via the internist regardless of how far Oita prefecture is from Hokkaido.

The students also had several questions concerning resource management for Hidaka kelp, how the earth and kelp are connected, the ecology of kelp, other Samani local specialties, and about the 2nd year harvesting of kelp. You could tell that they were paying close attention and showed lots of interest in the subject matter.

Hand-picked kelp (July 19, 2021)

Here are a few things that we realized after the learning course was over:

1) It's easier to understand when the materials are at hand

2) Use easy to understand videos that can also be used as supplementary materials in case of bad weather

3) This led to a rediscovering of Hidaka kelp

4) Sometimes it's hard to hear with words alone

We were worried that it might not go well, but in the end, it was quite fun!

This initiative was also shared on the Oita Himeshima Geopark homepage, please check it out.

https://www.himeshima.jp/geopark-news/geopark-topics/r30830gakushu/