Instructor’s Name: Gemma Griffin
Grade: K-1
Time: 45 minutes
Topic: Animal Adaptations
Concept: Camouflage
SOL: Science:
K.6 The student will investigate and understand basic needs and life processes of animals.
1.5 The student will investigate and understand that animals, including people, have life needs and specific physical characteristics and can be classified according to certain characteristics: physical characteristics (body coverings).
Rationale:
In order to promote students’ respect for all living creatures, it is important to help students become aware of their habitats. Having students observe animals’ habitats, and how they survive in them, will help students to respect them when they do encounter them in a non-academic setting.
Goals:
- To investigate ways camouflage can help animals survive.
- To connect art and science.
- To investigate polar bears and their habitat.
Objectives:
Cognitive:
The student will be able to identify the term “camouflage” and its importance to animal survival; evidenced by participation in class discussion about polar bears and where they live.
Psychomotor:
The student will be able to find, count, and graph the number of beans in their outdoor hunt; evidenced by a class graph.
Affective:
The student will be able to recognize the importance of a polar bear’s coloring and habitat to his survival; evidenced by participation in class discussion during an art activity in which students experiment with a polar bear in different “habitats”.
Materials:
Colored beans or toothpicks, one large piece of chart paper, a piece of white drawing paper for each student, a bear cutout for each student, glue, sponges, paint
Advanced Organizer:
Scatter colored toothpicks in the grass near your school, and give children a few minutes to pick up as many as possible. Graph the results. Ask “Why did you find fewer green toothpicks?”
Procedure:
- Tell children they are going to make a polar bear painting. Provide each child with a piece of white drawing paper and a white bear cutout. Help children glue the cutout to the paper. Use only ONE drop of glue. Ask “Is seeing the polar bear on the white paper easy or hard?”
- Distribute sponges and paint and have students sponge paint around the bear cutout to the edge of the paper. Let the paintings dry and peel off the bear cutout. Ask “Is seeing the polar bear on the colored paper easy or hard?”
- Discuss with students where polar bears live and why they are white. Children can then complete their paintings by adding a face with black crayon.
Questions for Discussion:
Discuss with students where polar bears live and why they are white.
Closure:
Children can then complete their paintings by adding a face with black crayon.
Assessment:
Observation of student participation in class discussion and graphing.
Differentiation:
This lesson was differentiated for verbal, mathematical, spatial and kinesthetic learners, as well as provided for artistic interests.