Lesson: Biomes - Aquatic

If the earth's surface is 70% water, in what ways are this body of water subdivided in relation to life?

This lesson examines aquatic habitats. How do organisms survive and interact? What factors limit or promote life? How are oceans different from rivers from lakes? There's a lot to this lesson, but it attempts to distill many diverse factors into focus and expose students to an incredibly complex and diverse set of habitats that all share the common theme of "water."

Instruction, Presentations, Assignments, Activities, etc:

Notes - Major Aquatic Habitats

Diagram - Ocean Zones (diagram) (key and info)

HMS Challenger and Jacques Costeau - presentation/video interest grabber

Notes - Watersheds and River Systems

Closure: Handout - Chesapeake Bay -Students analyze a map of the bay and identify key features of estuaries

Closure: Look at lakes on Google Earth, look at diagrams of lake succession

Web Resources:

Intertidal Zone - Area between highest highs, lowest low tides

Kelp Forest - Areas of large, fast growing algae

Coral Reef- complex structures with animal (coral) as home to algae found in shallow tropical waters

Hydrothermal Vent Communities (review)- strange, only recently discovered

diagrams of lake succession