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Outdoor classrooms are sprouting like mushrooms in schools across Frederick County.

From schoolyard wetlands and meadows to gardens where students use flowers to monitor ozone pollution in the air, schools are creating their own backyard habitats where students can study native plants and animals.

Many of them participate in the schoolyard habitat program, which encourages schools to create opportunities for students to get out, get dirty and through hands-on lessons learn about the Chesapeake Bay watershed.

The program is available in 15 Frederick County schools. Three new schools — Deer Crossing Elementary, Urbana High and Brunswick High — started this year, and more are likely to join in the future, said April Wells, the teacher specialist who coordinates schoolyard habitats.

"I get e-mails from people about this all the time," Wells said. "We have three or four more schools that may be joining next year."

The schoolyard habitat program allows Frederick County Public Schools to fulfill the Chesapeake Bay 2000 agreement, which requires students in Maryland, Pennsylvania, Virginia and the District of Columbia to learn about the Chesapeake Bay through hands-on projects and activities. In Maryland, students have to participate in three such projects — in elementary, middle and high school.

The schoolyard habitat program allows students to gain these experiences in the backyard of their own schools without having to take a field trip, Wells said.

In Frederick County, the schoolyard habitat program started at nine schools as a pilot thanks to a grant from the Chesapeake Bay Trust.

A local conservation group called Community Commons then helped the school system secure another three-year, $200,000 grant from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

Now, the school system has secured a three-year $300,000 grant to fund the schoolyard habitat program in 15 schools through 2012.

The grant pays for Wells' salary and allows her to hold workshops and training for teachers in schools that are new to the schoolyard habitat initiative. She helps individual schools launch their own schoolyard habitats, and connects teachers with agencies and partnerships that provide grants and support for schoolyard habitats.

Meanwhile, Wells also works with schools that have launched schoolyard habitats and outdoor classroom initiatives independently of the Chesapeake Bay Trust program.

Wells estimates that nearly half of the 64 schools in the county have in some shape or form worked to develop an outdoor habitat for students.