Berkshire Museum
Adopt a Schoolyard Tree
Help young scientists connect with nature and learn about trees with a fun life science lesson. Heading out into the school yard, children choose a tree to adopt, taking measurements, writing descriptions, and drawing sketches of it in...
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Life Cycle of Trees
Turn your learners into young tree-tectives with this fun science investigation into the life of trees. To begin, a class volunteer gets dressed up in a tree costume as the different parts of trees are introduced. Then, the class...
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The Seasons
Students identify seasonal changes. In this seasons lesson, students choose a tree on the playground to observe each season. Students record their observations throughout the year and create personal seasonal booklets.
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Seasons of Trees
Students examine how trees change over time. For this forestry lesson, students read the book The Seasons of Arnold's Apple Tree and choose three trees to observe over a period of time. Students record observations and seasonal changes...
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Signs of Change: Tree Rings
Students identify and experiment with dendrochronology (the study of tree rings to answer ecological questions about the recent past) and come up with conclusions as to what possible climatic conditions might affect tree growth in their...
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Spring is Here
Students analyze changes between winter and spring. In this seasonal changes lesson, students read the story "Spring is Here." They record changes between winter and spring on a large chart paper. Students compare and contrast the...
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Charting the Changes in Our School Forest
Fourth graders investigate the ecosystem and how forests are disappearing. In this environmental protection lesson plan, 4th graders analyze the changes in their school for 2 weeks. Students practice identifying trees, birds,...
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Adopt a Tree
Students adopt tress on their school campus for scientific observation purposes. In this tree science lesson, students adopt a tree at their school, observe the season changes for the tree, and create a PowerPoint presentation about the...
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Look At Those Leaves!
Kids observe, classify, and measure tree leaves with a scientific eye. They examine leaves, group them according their attributes, and use standard units of measurement as they compare their sizes. They access a web site to learn how...
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Tree Cookies
Students identify heartwood, sapwood, and a tree's annual rings, infer from a tree's rings what damage or stress might have occurred in its life, and make a time-line of human history that coincides with a tree's rings.
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Trees: Recorders of Climate Change
Students study cross sections of trees or tree "cookies" to discover how the rings on tree sections give clues to the climate during the time the ring was produced. They study simulated cross sections of trees to determine the climate...
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Trees: Are They Thriving or Surviving?
In this trees survival lesson plan, 8th graders discuss what trees need to grow, brainstorm things that could adversely affect tree growth, and compare characteristics of thriving trees vs. surviving trees. Students learn about the...
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Global Change- Time and Cycles
Students study trees and their growth. In this investigative instructional activity students work in groups to reconstruct a 50 year climatic history using a simulated tree ring.
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Look At Those Leaves!
Students collect, measure and classify leaves. In this inquiry-based sorting and classifying instructional activity, students look at various types of leaves they have collected and measure them using a standard unit of measurement....
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Color Change in Leaves
Learners identify the different leaf pigments and colors. In this biology activity, students perform chromatography to separate them. They explain how light affects green leaf colors and causes falling leaves in autumn.
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Animals, Soil, Trees
Fourth graders describe the various kinds of soils and how plants and animals are affected by them. They describe the baic needs of plants, scoring at least a 3 or 4 on a 4-point rubic. Students are able to predict and/or infer what...
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Crayon Resist Fall Leaves
Students study and explore the season of fall and investigate why fall leaves change color. Students explore the crayon resist technique and discuss other events of the fall season.
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Leaf Magic
Third graders adopt a deciduous tree in September, and begin regular observations of their tree. They create a timeline to show how leaves change color and conduct a science experiment to illustrate color change.
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Forest Food Webs
Learners consider the interdependency of life in a temperate forest by studying selected organisms from an Asian temperate forest and creating a food web.
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Autumn
Take a walk through the forest as the leaves change color and fall from the trees, making way for a new ecosystem cycle to cycle through. An inquiry-based lesson plan examines how the process of decomposition eliminates tons of...
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Fall Slumbers
Students observe changes in a selected tree leaf near their homes during the fall. Twice each week students record changes in the leaf using words, pictures, and numbers.
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Cloud Reading
Middle schoolers identify the biomes of the Earth and their characteristics. They discuss their favorite seasons and the weather. They share their favorites with the class.
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The Woods and Pond
Learners participate in hands-on activities to explore their natural surroundings. They recognize that ponds and woods are ecosystems and compare differences between the two. They identify trees by their bark and leaves.
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What's in Our Woods?
Students observe their local forest and document the change that occurs over the school year. For this forestry instructional activity, students utilize a GPS to mark a certain area of the woods as their study area for the...