If A Dolphin Were A Fish

🎓 Audience

Education: Grade(s) K, 1, 2, 3, 4, Homeschool/Family, Learning Pod, Library Patrons

 🐾 Topics

Language Arts/English, Literacy, Reading, Science, STEM

🗂️ Format

• Introduction and Prior Knowledge: Learners are invited to share what they know, what they’ve observed in nature, and what they’re curious to learn about dolphins and other marine life.

• Segment 1 - Story Time: We read If a Dolphin Were a Fish together. As the story unfolds, learners explore reading comprehension through interactive discussion, making predictions, and comparing and contrasting adaptations.

• Segment 2 - Am I a Mammal: We review key moments from the story and connect them to real dolphin traits and behaviors. Learners take a closer look at dolphin anatomy, models, and other biofacts. We compare mammal traits with reptiles and other creatures.

• Segment 3 - Q&A Session: We conclude with a live, educator-led Q&A about marine mammals, their care at Mote, and how healthy oceans support both wildlife and people.

🎯 Objectives

1. Describe the physical features and behaviors of dolphins and other ocean animals.

2. Compare dolphins as mammals to animals like fish, sea turtles, pelicans, sharks, and octopuses.

3. Engage in a discussion about how different animals are adapted to live in ocean habitats.

4. Explore how humans care for marine animals and help protect their environments.

5. Develop curiosity and confidence in asking questions about animals and how they live.

✏️ Standards this program supports

• CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.K.RI.1 – With prompting and support, ask and answer questions about key details in a text. Application: Learners are guided through a read-aloud of Delfina’s story and prompted to ask and answer questions about how each animal is different and what makes dolphins mammals.

• CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.1.RI.1 – Ask and answer questions about key details in a text. Application: Learners respond to comprehension questions and revisit key animal transformations to understand how Delfina’s traits compare with other ocean creatures.

• CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.1.RL.5 – Explain major differences between books that tell stories and books that give information, drawing on a wide reading of a range of text types. Application: Learners compare the fictional elements of Delfina’s adventure with factual animal traits presented in the learning segment.

• CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.2.RI.1 – Ask and answer such questions as who, what, where, when, why, and how to demonstrate understanding of key details in a text. Application: Learners explore the sequence of Delfina’s imagined changes and how each animal lives in its environment, using guided questions and class discussion.

• CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.3.RL.1 – Ask and answer questions to demonstrate understanding of a text, referring explicitly to the text as the basis for the answers. Application: Learners cite examples from the story to explain how each animal is adapted to its ocean habitat and what sets mammals apart from other sea creatures.

Next Generation Science Standards

• K-LS1.C: Organization for Matter and Energy Flow in Organisms. Application: Learners identify that all animals need food to live and grow, and explore how dolphins, sharks, manatees, and others get food from plants or other animals.

• 1-LS1.A: Structure and Function. Application: Learners describe how dolphins, fish, and other animals use body parts such as flippers, gills, and blowholes to move, breathe, and survive.

• 1-LS1.D: Information Processing. Application: Learners explore how animals like dolphins use senses such as echolocation and sharks use smell to respond to their environment and stay safe.

• 2-ESS2.C: The Roles of Water in Earth’s Surface Processes. Application: Learners recognize that water is found in oceans, rivers, and other bodies, and that marine animals are adapted to these different aquatic habitats.

• 2-LS4.D: Biodiversity and Humans. Application: Learners identify different kinds of living things in ocean environments and discuss how they are suited to live in water.

• 4-LS1.A: Structure and Function. Application: Learners explain how marine animals have both internal and external body parts that help with survival, movement, and behavior in the ocean.

• 5-ESS2.A: Earth Materials and Systems. Application: Learners understand that the ocean supports diverse organisms, helps shape landforms, and affects Earth’s systems including climate.

UN Sustainable Development Goals

• • 14 - Life Below Water

  • 15 - Life On Land

• Additional list of national alignments is available from Arbordale Publishing.

Florida Next Generation Sunshine State Standards (NGSSS)

• SC.K.L.14.3 – Observe plants and animals, describe how they are alike and how they are different in the way they look and in the things they do. Application: Learners observe dolphins and other ocean animals and compare how they look, move, breathe, and live in the sea.

• SC.1.L.14.1 – Make observations of living things and their environment using the five senses. Application: Learners use sight and sound to explore how animals like dolphins, sharks, and octopuses survive in the ocean, focusing on features like fins, blowholes, and senses.

• SC.2.L.17.1 – Compare and contrast the basic needs that all living things, including humans, have for survival. Application: Learners compare the needs of dolphins and other marine animals with those of humans and discuss how people can help protect ocean habitats.

• SC.3.L.15.1 – Classify animals into major groups according to their physical characteristics and behaviors. Application: Learners classify dolphins as mammals and compare them with fish, birds, reptiles, and invertebrates based on traits like breathing, movement, skin covering, and reproduction.

• SC.4.L.17.4 – Recognize ways plants and animals, including humans, can impact the environment. Application: Learners reflect on how human actions affect ocean animals and habitats and discuss ways to care for marine life through conservation and responsible behavior.

• Additional list of Florida standards alignments is available from Arbordale Publishing.

☑️ Evaluation Link

When answering these questions, please focus on the quality of the content and not the technology. You can answer anonymously. After clicking Did the program take place?, choose if you are you an Educator or Parent.

• cilc.org/ContentProvider/Evaluation

Nouns

Words that name animals, body parts, places, or things.

• adaptation: A body part or behavior that helps an animal live in its environment.

• air: What we breathe; it has the oxygen we need to live.

• animal: A living creature that moves, breathes, and eats.

• apex predator: An animal at the top of the food chain that hunts but is not hunted.

• aquarium: A place where an aquatic animal is cared for and where people can learn about it.

• backbone: The spine or main bone that runs down an animal’s back.

• beach: The sandy area along the edge of the ocean or a lake.

• bird: An animal with feather, wing, and a beak that usually lays an egg.

• blowhole: The hole on top of a dolphin or whale’s head used to breathe.

• blubber: A thick layer of fat that keeps an animal warm in cold water.

• bone: A hard part that makes up the skeleton of an animal.

• birth: The time when a baby animal comes into the world.

• calf: A baby dolphin or other large mammal.

• carnivore: An animal that eats only other animals.

• dolphin: A smart, playful ocean mammal that breathes air and can use sound to find things.

• echolocation: Using sound echoes to find objects or move around, like dolphins and bats.

• egg: A round or oval object that some animals lay and a baby hatches from. Sea turtles and pelicans lay eggs.

• feather: A soft part that covers a bird’s body and helps it fly or stay warm.

• fish: An animal that lives in water, has gill, and usually has scale.

• flipper: A flat limb used by a sea animal like a dolphin or sea turtle to swim.

• food: Something an animal eats to get energy and grow.

• fur: Thick hair that keeps an animal warm.

• gill: A body part that helps a fish breathe underwater.

• habitat: The place where an animal lives and finds everything it needs to survive.

• hair: A strand that grows from the skin of a mammal.

• hatchling: A baby turtle that has just come out of its egg.

• herbivore: An animal that eats only plants.

• invertebrate: An animal without a backbone.

• life: The way an animal exists or makes a home.

• lung: A body part that helps an animal breathe air.

• manatee: A large, gentle plant-eating marine mammal that lives in warm water.

• mammal: An animal with fur or hair that is warm inside and feeds its baby milk. A dolphin is a mammal.

• milk: The liquid a mother mammal makes to feed her baby.

• ocean: The large, salty body of water that covers most of Earth.

• octopus: A soft-bodied sea animal with eight arms. Octopus have no bones.

• omnivore: An animal that eats both plants and meat.

• plant: A living thing that grows in soil or water and makes its own food.

• reptile: An animal with dry, scaly skin that usually lays eggs. A sea turtle is a reptile.

• scale: A small, hard plate that covers the skin of a fish or reptile.

• sea turtle: A reptile that lives in the ocean and lays eggs on the beach.

• shark: A large fish with sharp teeth that lives in the ocean.

• skeleton: All the bones in a body that give it shape and support.

• skull: The bone that protects the brain.

• snout: The nose or jaw area of an animal’s face.

• squid: A soft-bodied sea animal with arms and tentacles.

• vertebrate: An animal with a backbone.

• water: The liquid all living things need to survive.

Verbs

Words that describe actions.

• breathe: To take in air or water to get oxygen.

• drink: To take in water or other liquid.

• eat: To take in food.

• jump: To push off the ground and go into the air.

• lay: To produce an egg.

Adjectives

Words that describe or give more information about a noun.

• aquatic: Living in or near water.

• cold: Having little heat.

• ectothermic: An animal that gets body heat from outside sources, like the sun.

• endothermic: An animal that makes its own body heat to stay warm.

• warm: Having heat or feeling cozy.

• underwater: Happening below the surface of water.

• marine: Related to the ocean. (Can also be used as a noun.)

Play Dolphin Bingo

Play virtual bingo using a computer, smartphone or tablet during your program to focus on key concepts and vocabulary.

• Online

• On paper/PDF

🌐 Websites

• Mahi-mahi (Coryphaena hippurus)

• Dolphin Conservation for Teachers and Students

• Fun and Fascinating Facts About Dolphins

• Dolphin Puzzles

• What makes a dolphin's house a home?

📚 Books & Publications

•  If A Dolphin Were A Fish by Loran Wlodarski and illustrated by Laure Allen Klein

• Dolphins: Learned Behaviors by Laure Allen Klein

• Animal Helpers: Aquariums by Jennifer Keats Curtis

🖥️ Videos

• Excerpt from If a Dolphin Were a Fish, a interactive video lesson from Mote