Survivor!

How can you tell if something is living or nonliving? Introduce a set of criteria which can be used to determine which things are alive and which are not. The class discusses the basic needs of all living organisms, checks out an...

Determine your class's prior knowledge about the necessities of life with this pre-assessment for a unit on living things. Learners draw pictures of themselves with all the things they need to live, grow, and survive. These drawings will...

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...

It's alive! Or is it? Through a series of shared readings, whole class activities, and independent exercises children explore the difference between living and non-living things, creating a pair of printable books...

An engaging, multi-session art and science lesson awaits your class. Within this lesson, you'll find everything you need to implement the plan. They go on a nature walk around their school, and must identify many living and non-living...

In this lesson, 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 understanding of...

Students photograph five objects from a bag and five objects from the outdoors. Students categorize things by living and non-living and by properties such as color, size, structure and needs. Students draw conclusions about the basic...

This is a pre-assessment to be done at the beginning of a unit on the needs of living things. Students draw themselves and what they need to survive. The lesson can be downloaded in PDF format.

This lesson focuses on living things' need for water. Students make lemonade and learn that water can be found in liquids other than a glass of water, and is also found in plants. The lesson can be downloaded in PDF format.

A post-assessment at the end of a unit on the needs of living things. The lesson materials can be downloaded in PDF format.