Lesson plan
Class: Life Science Unit: Evolution or Climate Change
Prior Knowledge: Students should have a pre-existing knowledge of environmental topics such as levels of organization (e.g., individual species through the biosphere), biotic factors, abiotic factors, producers, consumers, food chains, food webs, ecological pyramids, and biodiversity.
Objectives:
• Students will develop a list of traits which provide an animal of their choosing with advantages (adaptation). • Students will model evolution by natural selection and the effects of climate change.
• Students will analyze and evaluate traits that contribute to animal survival (e.g., bird beaks as adaptations suitable for specific food sources).
• Students will suggest ways in which climate change may affect biodiversity as well as evolution by way of natural selection. • Students will analyze the effects of climate change on ecosystems.
Materials:
• 6 dishes of “food” (Appendix A)
• A handful of each of the following items:
-Marbles -Dried beans -Rice grains -Marshmallows -Skittles®
• Variety of “beaks” (Appendix B) -
• 2 small “nests” (collection dishes)
Forceps/tweezers
- Chopsticks - Test tube clamp - Plastic knife - Plastic spoon -
Scoopula
Preparation: Gather the materials listed. Adjust the numbers of tools and food to meet your classroom needs. This activ- ity can be done on lab tables or outdoors for an added challenge. The bird “nests” should be equally spaced (~30 cm) from the food collection dish. You may wish to increase or decrease the spacing to accommodate students with specific needs. Reference Appendix C for an example.
Instructional sequence Day 1
I. Engage students with relevant phenomena (10–15 minutes). 1.
Show the video El Niño Impact in Galápa- gos (Appendix D, Resource 1) using an overhead projector. This video summa- rizes how natural events can greatly affect fragile ecosystems and their atten- dant wildlife.
2.
Spark an engaging inquiry-driven discus- sion about what students think happened to the animals of the Galápagos. Guide the discussion with open-ended prompts (e.g., What are you curious about? Which question would you want to explore fur- ther? What do you predict will happen?). Ask students to create their questions and hypotheses using their prior knowl- edge or experiences before writing their answers on the board. Optional: Instead
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• Timer/stopwatch • Calculator • Student Data Table
• Computer with internet access (for extension activity)
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