Lesson plan

Introduction: 

1. Today we are going to go on a school habitat hunt. What is a habitat? 

2. Our school is a habitat or home for lots of different living things. Can you tell me what living things you have seen in our school? 

3. We are going to go on a hunt to find some of these living things and we're going to record or 'collect data' on these living things using a worksheet. 

Activity: 

1. Distribute the School habitat hunt worksheet (below). Discuss the external features of each plant and animal so that students are able to confidently identify them while out in the school yard. 

2. Take the students on a nature walk around the school to observe different living things. Ask students to tally the different types of plants and animals in the relevant square on their worksheet. 

3. Once complete, discuss the  different living things the students found and their features. 
   
   

Materials: School habitat hunt worksheet, clipboards, pens/pencils.

Student worksheet

Lesson plan

Introduction: 

1. Discuss the different animals found during the school habitat hunt lesson. 

2. Explain to students that they are going to make one of the animals they saw on their habitat hunt using clay and natural materials found in the school. 

Activity:

1. Choose two or three animals mentioned during the animal hunt. For example, bird, ant or dragonfly.

2. Discuss the different features of each animal. Use the teacher resource below to assist with this. 

3. Demonstrate to students how to create a clay animal using clay and natural materials found around the school. For example, sticks, seed pods, leaves, small rocks.

4. Distribute clay and allow students time to create their animals. 

5. Have students present their animals to the class with an emphasis on identifying the animals external features. 

Note: The Illawarra EEC Habitat Heroes Lesson 2 Create a Creature web page contains videos and images that may assist with this lesson. 

Materials: Labelled animals teacher resource, clay (or playdough), natural materials (sticks, seed pods, leaves, small rocks).

Teacher resource

Lesson plan

Introduction: 

1. Introduce the idea to students that when living things grow, they often change at different stages of their lives. For example, a caterpillar. Who remembers the book, The Very Hungry Caterpillar. How did the caterpillar change during the book?

2. Can you think of any other examples of animals that change during the different stages of their lives?

Activity:

1. Explain to the students that they are going to learn about the changes that occur during a frog's life cycle. 

2. Watch the following video reading from the book 'From Tadpole to Frog'. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mmx1LMuvSCo 

3. Discuss the different stages of the life cycle of a frog. 

4. Distribute the colour in worksheet (below) to students for colouring.

5. Show students the following presentation on dragonflies. https://british-dragonflies.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/Dragonflies-Presentation.pdf 

6. Complete the activities on the life cycle of a dragonfly in the worksheet provided on this website. https://www.sparklebox.co.uk/previews/10851-10875/sb10862-dragonfly-growth-cut-stick-activity.html 

7. Discuss the differences between the life cycle of a frog and the life cycle of a dragonfly.