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Website
PBS

Pbs Learning Media: Animal Shelter Photographer

For Students 3rd - 8th
In this WILD TV segment, a photographer helps find homes for animals up for adoption.
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Article
Cornell Lab of Ornithology

Habitat Network: Structure, Cover, & Shelter

For Students 9th - 10th
Learn how to build an appropriate habitat for birds and other animals to maintain structural diversity.
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Website
Other

Operation Santa Paws: Holiday Toys and Treats for Shelter Pets

For Students Pre-K - 1st
Here is an idea for organizing a volunteer effort to collect needed items for animal shelters.
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Handout
Other

Broward Community College: The Gopher Tortoise

For Students 9th - 10th
The population of the gopher tortoise is limited by homes, roads, and buildings made by humans. This valuable species creates burrows that provide shelter for numerous creatures during natural disasters like forest fires. This site...
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Primary
BioEd Online

Bio Ed Online: Living Things and Their Needs Teacher's Guide

For Teachers K - 1st
This is a free downloadable teacher's guide (PDF) to teach young children (grades K-2) about living things and their needs.
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Activity
PBS

Pbs Learning Media: Center Card: Build an Animal Habitat

For Students Pre-K - K
Children design an animal habitat and talk about how the habitat provides the animal's basic needs -- shelter, water, and food -- using this block center activity. It includes three resources.
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Lesson Plan
Alabama Learning Exchange

Alex: Habitats

For Teachers Pre-K - 1st
What is a habitat? In this lesson, learners will identify that a habitat has four elements, food, water, shelter, and space. Students will identify their own habitat and create a brochure describing the habitat in terms of food, water,...
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Article
Other

Springboard Magazine: Animal Homes

For Students Pre-K - 1st
A nice overview of the reasons why animals need homes as well as different types of homes. Some of the shelters featured include, borrows, hives, dens, nests, and tree hollows.
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Unit Plan
Wonderville Media

Animal World/wonderville: Dogs

For Students K - 1st
Dogs have needs just like you. They need food, water, shelter, grooming, exercise, health care, and love. Learn more about dogs in this well-constructed overview by Wonderville.
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Activity
TeachEngineering

Teach Engineering: Live Like an Animal

For Teachers 6th - 8th
In this activity, students design an innovative human shelter that is inspired and informed by an animal structure. Each group is assigned an animal class, and they gather information about shelters used by the animals in that class....
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Lesson Plan
New York Times

New York Times: Scribd: Living Things Cause Changes on Earth Lesson Plan

For Teachers 1st - 3rd
This detailed lesson plan will have the students researching why and how animals make changes to the Earth. Students will discover that animals make changes on Earth for various reasons such as shelter, protection from predators, and...
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Lesson Plan
PBS

Pbs Learning Media: The Needs of Living Things

For Teachers K - 1st
In this instructional activity, students watch video clips of animals and plants in their natural environment, to gather evidence that all living things have basic needs that must be met in order to survive. Then, to illustrate their...
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Website
PBS

Nh Pbs: Nature Works: Habitat

For Students 3rd - 5th
What do you need to survive? Food, water, shelter? Animals need the same things and they live in places that can provide them. This informative site looks at the characteristics, range, habitat, food, reproduction and behavior of the red...
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Professional Doc
Buck Institute

Buck Institute for Education: Pblu: Schoolyard Habitat Project

For Teachers 9th - 10th
An example of a project-based learning opportunity that engages students in learning what a healthy habitat is by working within the school's campus to increase opportunity for animals to find food and shelter, maintaining plants, and...