Rainforest Alliance
Colombia Biodiversity
How diverse is the rainforest? How much more diverse is a rain forest than a temperate forest? Explore these focus questions in a lesson that explores the plants, animals, and insects in forests. After listening to a reading about...
Rainforest Alliance
Get in Touch with Nature
Take a trip to the Colombian rainforest through the sense of touch. Here, class members discover what's inside a mystery box: wood, cinnamon, Brazil nuts, a banana, and orange. Then, the class takes a trip outside for a tree rubbing...
Curated OER
Why Does the Cocoa Tree Need a Tropical Rainforest to Grow?
Fourth graders explore the requirements a cocoa plant needs to survive. They research where chocolate comes from and how humans can affect the growth of cocoa trees. Students create a 3-D model of a cocoa tree and compare and contrast...
Curated OER
Independence and Conservation
Young scholars read an original story "Brothers of the Rainforest" downloaded from the internet site provided. Students investigate the impact of the demise of a particular species on the rest of the environment. Young scholars...
Curated OER
How Can Clear of Tress Destroy a Community?
Fifth graders brainstorm the relationship between trees and humans to determine how humans benefit from trees and how they benefit from us. They discuss oxygen/carbon dioxide exchange, soil stablization, animal habitat, shade, medicine...
Rainforest Alliance
Looking at Leaves
Discover the Colombian rainforest through a presentation that follows a young girl named Chayo. Chayo describes her daily life, exploring the rainforest filled with plants and animals. After getting to know Chayo, scholars go on a nature...
Curated OER
How Can We Keep Our Forests Intact and Have Our Chocolate Too?
Fourth graders explore various methods of growing and harvesting rainforest foods in order to sustain its biodiversity. They discuss the various uses for trees from several viewpoints. Students research chocolate demand and land use...
Curated OER
Whose Breakfast isn't for the Birds?
Learners explore coffee production. In this cross-curriculum rainforest ecology instructional activity, students research regions where coffee comes from and investigate how the native birds in the rainforest are effected by coffee...
Curated OER
Birds and Coffee
Fifth graders identify the changing seasons with how they affect animal and human behavior. They explain what migration is and why many birds migrate south for the winter. They then trace the coffee sold in their neighborhood and in...
Curated OER
How can we keep our forests intact and have chocolate too?
Fourth graders recognize the need to sustain crops in the rainforest. For this rainforest lesson, 4th graders consider the use of products from the rainforest. Students discuss how people of different points of view decide what to do...
Curated OER
How can my breakfast help the birds?
Sixth graders design farms with a bird's habitat in mind. In this farm lesson plan, 6th graders research how sun grown coffee destroys a bird habitat, and then they make their own farm with a bird's habitat being preserved. They then...
Curated OER
Surviving in Our Ecosystems
Third graders identify the characteristics of a frog and compare them to a human child. They draw and describe the best environment for a human to live in and the best environment for a frog to live in based on their physical...
Rainforest Alliance
Climate Educator Guide
Climate change is a hot topic in the news. Class members examine carbon dioxide data to analyze trends of our atmospheric makeup over time. They also discuss climate and climate change, and determine how these changes are affecting life...
Curated OER
Hyperlink Habitats
Young scholars explore an online Hyperlink Habitat to illustrate the interconnectedness of a tropical rainforest ecosystem. They create a map of the Hyperlink Habitat and research a local ecosystem and create their own print or Web...
Curated OER
Hyperlink Habitats
Students explore a series of Web pages designed to illustrate the interconnectedness of a tropical rainforest ecosystem. They discuss their research, create maps and research a local ecosystem.
Rainforest Alliance
Protecting the Critical Habitat of the Manatee and Loggerhead Turtle
Explore ocean habitats with a lesson that showcases the home of manatees and loggerhead turtles in Belize. Here, pupils compare and contrast the homes of ocean animals to those of humans, listen to an original short story about the...
Rainforest Alliance
Stop and Smell the Flowers
It's a bird! It's a bee! Actually, it's your learners flying from flower to flower smelling their scents! Using paper flowers and essential oils, pupils flutter between flowers to use their sense of smell to experience how animals use...
Rainforest Alliance
How Do Jaguars and Howler Monkeys in Belize Depend on Us?
How does weather play a role in the lives of land and sea creatures? Find out with a lesson focused on habitats and the ways animals from different homes are connected. Here, learners explore how the life of a jaguar and howler monkey...
Rainforest Alliance
The Long Road to Coffee
During the fourth lesson of a series on Colombia, pupils discover the process to which the coffee plant becomes the coffee we drink. Pupils compare how locally grown foods get into homes to how coffee from Colombia gets into their mug.
Rainforest Alliance
Knowing the Essential Elements of a Habitat
To gain insight into the many different types of habitats, individuals must first get to know their own. Here, scholars explore their school environment, draw a map, compare and contrast their surroundings to larger ones. They then write...
Rainforest Alliance
Trees and Carbon
You'll find everything but the kitchen sink here ... or just a carbon sink. In the activity, pairs or groups of middle school learners go outside and measure a tree's circumference and height to estimate its carbon storage potential and...
Rainforest Alliance
The Carbon Cycle
Scholars learn about the carbon cycle, play a carbon cycle game, and then write a story based on their role as a carbon atom during the game. After the writings, pupils analyze the carbon cycle by leading a class discussion on the material.
Rainforest Alliance
Forests of Guatemala
With 90 percent of its land area covered in forests, Suriname, a country in South America, contains the largest percentage of forests throughout the world. Here is an activity that brings classmates together to learn about the...
Rainforest Alliance
Investments in Forest Carbon
One hundred metric tons of CO2 can accumulate in one acre of forest over time—that's a lot of carbon! In the activity, groups of middle school learners determine what makes forests important. They then solidify the concept by using a...