Baylor College
A Place to Be
Home sweet home. Humans, birds, beavers, ants, we all need a place place to rest and keep us safe. In the ninth lesson of this series, the importance of shelter is discussed as the teacher reads aloud the book Tillena Lou's Day in the...
Teach Engineering
How Big? Necessary Area and Volume for Shelter
Teams must determine the size of cavern needed to house the citizens of Alabraska to protect them from the asteroid impact. Using scaling properties, teams first determining the number of people that could sleep in a classroom and then...
Curated OER
Mapping Your School Site
Students map a map of their school. In this school map lesson plan, students make a map of their school, record major features, and not wildlife on the school grounds.
Teach Engineering
Incoming Asteroid! What's the Problem?
Oh, no! An asteroid is on a collision course with Earth!. Class members must rise to the challenge of designing a shelter that will protect people from the impact and permit them to live in this shelter for one year. In this first lesson...
Alabama Wildlife Federation
Butterfly Gardening
Build a place for butterflies to call home. After identifying the needs of butterflies in terms of water, food, shelter, and reproduction, learners create a scale model of their ideal butterfly garden. Once the model is complete, they...
Curated OER
School Forest
Sixth graders explore the concept of biodiversity. In this biodiversity lesson, 6th graders discover a variety of planets and animals that live in forests, and how a rotting log benefits that environment. Students also locate seven...
Curated OER
Hurricanes
Learners explore the history of hurricanes. They discuss the worst hurricanes that have formed. Students examine what to expect during a hurricane and the preparations they should make. They learn about evacuation routes, shelters, and...
Teach Engineering
Rocks, Rocks, Rocks: Test, Identify Properties and Classify
Time is growing short. Teams work together to identify physical properties of rocks in order to determine the properties that would best suit their cavern shelter design.
Baylor College
Need or Want?
Even as adults it can be hard to distinguish needs from wants. Using pictures of common, everyday items, children make a pocket chart separating the objects they need from those that they want. Discuss their choices, explaining that...
Curated OER
Cats
Students participate in an after school program that promotes communication with others, solving problems, and making decisions. They experience getting in touch with themselves, about cats, training cats, showing cats and explore...
Curated OER
Too Cool for School-The Greenhouse Experiment
Students create a town model and analyze the type of greenhouse gases their town emits. In this earth science lesson plan, students build greenhouses to investigate how trapped heat causes temperature change. They relate this activity to...
Curated OER
Links in the Chain of Life
Using the prairie dog community as an example, middle school ecologists examine the food web. Pairs of learners take one species in the community and research its role in the ecosystem. They share their findings with the rest of the...
Curated OER
Wildlife Burrows
Burrowing animals are busy! Get your middle school ecologists busy as well by having them create a scale model of a burrowing population. They also design a PowerPoint or poster to explain their models.
Curated OER
Biotechnology
A continuous cascade of information comes through this PowerPoint on biotechnology. The topic is defined, a history is presented, and basic genetic engineering techniques are explained. The topic is covered in an objective manner,...
Curated OER
Functional Homes
Young scholars observe and reflect on habitats built and used by various life forms. They discover the benefits of the "homes" to the creature and its life and apply the natural designs to human uses.
Curated OER
How Does Climate Affect Your Environment?
Learners access the Global Sun Temperature Project website and research the relationship between the location and climate of a participating school to its building structure. They consider how climate affects the type of structures...
Curated OER
Ant Arcitecture
Students create pages of a classroom book on the different structures that ants build. They view and discuss a video on ants then, in small groups, research a type of ant shelter. They relate the shelter to the environment in which the...
Curated OER
Daily and Seasonal Cycles
First graders identify the sun as a source of heat and light. They identify features of houses that help keep use sheltered and comfortable throughout daily and seasonal cycles. Students are told that summer is the best season to...
Curated OER
Landscaping for Wildlife
Students identify the essential elements needed for promoting wildlife habitat. They describe the terms used in habitat design and the shelter for wildlife. Students explore how to create a pond to support wildlife and how to create a...
Curated OER
Life Systems - Plant Growth
3rd graders will participate in a variety of tasks which help them to understand the basic concepts of plant growth. Research and reporting skills are developed as they gather information from various sources related to the use of plants...
Curated OER
Nomad Land
Students explore the migratory movements of animals as they monitor their own movements throughout the school day. Climatic and feeding conditions are examined as cues for the movement.
Curated OER
Temperature in the Sun or Shade of the Desert
Third graders use thermometers to measure the air temperature in several
places around the school and then return to the classroom to record the data. They create a bar graph and discuss their findings about the air temperature in the...
Curated OER
In My Own Backyard
Pupils explore the soil and vegetation found in their home and/or school environment and map a familiar area. Each group is assigned a section of the schoolyard. They draw maps of their assigned places and gather soil and vegetation...
National Gardening Association
Migration Mishaps
Elementary ecologists pretend to be migratory hummingbirds. They fly between wintering and nesting grounds, trying to reach a habitat haven. In a musical-chair fashion, some birds will miss out, and are removed from the game. To further...