Curated OER
Galapagos: Beyond Darwin
Middle schoolers identify plants and animals endemic in their local area after learning about the plants and animals of the Galapagos Islands. In this plants and animals lesson plan, students create an endemic garden on school grounds.
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Let's Get Specific
Learners explore how different species thrive. For this speciation lesson students research and complete a lab activity.
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Blue Planet: Open Ocean
Young scholars research facts about animal species. In this ocean lesson students view a video, prepare illustrated cards and create a food-web display.
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Touching Traits
Students describe objects using only their sense of touch. In this lesson on describing characteristics, students use only their sense of touch to describe an unseen object in a box. This lesson can be used an an introduction to plant...
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Invasive Species
Students explore invasive species. In this species analysis instructional activity, students observe invasive species and review the impact the species have on the environment. Students work in groups to investigate the species in...
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Who Am I?
Students classify organisms into one of five categories: producer, consumer, decomposer, predator, or prey. Students play a "Who Am I" game. Signs are hung on the backs of fellow students They must ask questions to determine what...
Montana Natural History Center
Studying Grassland Ecosystems
At first glance, grassland ecosystems might seem dull and uninteresting, but once you start to explore it's amazing the things you'll find! Through this series of engaging lessons, activities, and experiments, elementary students examine...
Curated OER
Making Pretzels
Students explore how people use plants for food. They use pretzels to see how wheat can be turned into food.
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Red Tail Ridge Wetland Study Project
Fifth graders use a real life scenario of the wetlands to gather information on creatures of the habitat. For this wetlands lesson, 5th graders research the interdependence of organisms in a healthy habitat. Students collected samples...
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Exploring the Biomes of South America
Sixth graders complete a five-week unit investigating the eight major biomes of South America. They conduct Internet research, collect short-term and long-term climate data, and create a HyperStudio slideshow stack about a selected biome...
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Exploring Limu Diversity
Students explore limu diversity. In this ocean ecosystem lesson, students classify limu according to its physical properties. Students work in small groups to generate scientific observations and sort limu by characteristics.
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Natural Selection And Evolution
Students investigate the concept of evolution and how natural selection is used as an indicator that evolution has happened. They recognize the three effects it has on diversity and how adaptations can develop. Diversity is explained as...
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Classifying Living and Non-Living Objects
Students investigate living organisms and define the properties of a living species. In this life characteristic lesson, students examine plants in their class and discuss whether or not they are alive. Students create a living vs....
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Dichotomous Chips
Students create a dichotomous key to different varieties of potato chips. In small groups, they observe and record characteristics of the potato chips to use in the key. They switch keys with another group to see if they can identify an...
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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 lesson, students utilize a GPS to mark a certain area of the woods as their study area for the remainder of the year....
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Biodiversity in Illinois-Pond Habitats
Second graders construct a pond habitat in the classroom using a small swimming pool partially filled with water, real cattails, a tree log adjoining, and plastic animal life appropriate to a pond setting. They examine the frog in detail...
Curated OER
Biotic Factors
Students identify individual organism, a species, and a population within the study community. They identify biotic factors at the site and attempt to characterize the site's species diversity.
Curated OER
Arabian Camel or Dromedary
In this camel worksheet, learners study the diagram for an Arabian camel otherwise known as a dromedary. Students read the characteristics of the animal and may click on associated links to learn more.
Curated OER
Dig Magazine Archeology Quiz #106
In this Dig Magazine archeology quiz, students answer 12 multiple choice questions complementing the October 2009 issue. Page contains answer and additional resources link.