Looks Count! Community Planning, Natural Resource Protection, and the Visual Environment
Western Upper Peninsula Center for Science, Mathematics, and Environmental Education

Looks Count! is an interdisciplinary middle school curriculum unit that incorporates social studies, math, language arts, visual arts, and science into the design of the built environment. Funded by the Dunn Foundation and Wege Foundation, the curriculum has students identify their community character, find the connections between the visual and natural environment, conduct community surveys, learn how planning can preserve visual character, and become actively involved in shaping their community.

The main part of Looks Count! is 15 lesson plans that focus on a sense of place, suburban sprawl, community demographics, buildings, and much more. Also included are pre and post tests, vocabulary words, a unit assessment, and other resources. The lesson plans follow Michigan education content standards, but they are useful for schools in any state.

The print version of Looks Count! can be ordered for a low price. You can download the entire publication for free, or just individual lesson plans, from the table of contents page.