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Food Webs
Students identify predator/prey relationships based on the food web of the tropical rain forest ecosystem and realize they need a food web for survival. In this food web lesson plan, students complete a role play activity being animals...
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Ecosystem In A Bottle
Ecosystem activities show how everyone and everything is interconnected. The smallest change can make a big impact.
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Food Chains
Fourth graders study food chains, producers, consumers, and decomposers. They play a food chain game and create food chain mobiles or posters. They take a nature hike around the school and observe various parts of a food chain.
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Bird Up
Third graders identify basic physical and behavioral characteristics of birds and how they adapt to their environments. To organize and share scientific information with peers. They discuss similarities and differences among birds....
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The Effects of Pesticides on the Food Chain
Fourth graders generalize that all animals, including people, depend on plants as a food source. In this science lesson plan, 4th graders describe and construct a food chain, tell how pesticides enter the food chain, and discuss possible...
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What Lives in the Forest?
Students investigate nearby forests and record their interactions with trees as well as wild life. In this ecology lesson, students read the book, In the Woods: Who's Been Here?, and attend class observational field trips through...
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Planning a Railroad Online Lesson
Students design a train route using a topographical map. In this historical and spatial thinking lesson plan, students must plan a route through the Sierra Nevada mountains that a train could physically travel. Links to printable student...
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The Key To Classifying Animals
Explorers of the environment construct a dichotomous key for a variety of organisms and design a key to classify Galapagos animals based on descriptions and images. The lesson includes a link to an animal gallery and the worksheet for...
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First Contact
Sixth graders have an opportunity to enhance their computer skills by using Internet as a resource tool and a vehicle for global interaction with other students.
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Tree Top Canopy Field Trip
Students visit the Greenheart Canopy Walkway. In this environmental lesson, students experience a coastal rain forest ecosystem. Students interact and explore the different layers of the rain forest.
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The Life Cycle of the Mealworm
Fourth graders provide a habitat for live mealworms and observe their life cycle. In this animal life cycle and scientific inquiry lesson, 4th graders create a habitat for a live mealworm and observe and record related data as it grows....
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Rivers Through Time
Students read or have the book A River Ran Wild read to them. They discuss and reflect on the messages presented in the book. Students use their listening comprehension skills to draw conclusions. Students articulate several examples of...
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Create a New Animal
Students understand what physical adaptations are and how they help an animal to survive. In this adaptations lesson, students research four animals and then make an original animal that has adaptations to make them survive.
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Backyard Birds: Who's Who Out There?
Students practice techniques of field observation and data-gathering while studying local bird population, describe ecosystem as complex combination of elements, which can affect or be affected by each other, and determine effects of...
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Investigating Local Ecosystems
Students observe a local area for living organisms and their habitats. In this local ecosystems lesson, students complete an online field journal. Students share their findings and sort them into categories. Students visit a...
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Biomes
Young scholars collect information about different biomes, and locate the biomes on a world map. They read a climograph and match them to the appropriate biomes.
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Get to Know a Fish
Students discover the anatomy of a fish by identifying its body parts. For this oceanography lesson, students view a live fish in their classroom and draw a poster of the fish one body part at a time while identifying it....
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Body Voyager
Students explore the significance of a resting and an active heart rate. In this heart instructional activity students chart data on their pulse and draw a diagram of the heart.
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Charlotte's Web
Fourth graders focus on fluency by reading the book Charlotte's Web. In this reading strategies lesson, 4th graders partner read, do guided reading, and independent reading to increase fluency. Students use Venn Diagrams, discuss...
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My Little Seed House
Second graders explore plant life by participating in a germination activity. In this botany lesson plan, 2nd graders read several books about seed germination including Sunflower House and Tiny Seed. Students identify the necessary...
Michigan Sea Grant
Wetlands
Wetlands may not sound particularly ornate, but they are as important as any habitat! With a hands-on activity, young scientists build a wetland model and observe its many functions in action. They discover the importance of wetlands to...
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Wonderful World of Bats
Students create a book about bats. They write a letter to a scientist containing questions about bats. They compare the socialization of bats to humans; compare the needs of bats to humans and other animals.
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Water Use: Tragedy in the Owens River Valley
High schoolers examine water management issues. In this environmental issues instructional activity, students watch a PBS video to develop an understanding of watershed, aquifers, and ground water. High schoolers evaluate watershed...
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Coloring Fabrics With Dyes from Plant Materials K-12 Experiments & Background Information
Young scholars investigate the effects of acid and bases on dyes made with plant materials. In this chromatography lesson students predict color outcomes and complete a lab activity on color combinations.