Wildlife Research
4th Grade Pre-Field Trip
Teacher Instructions:
Set up each discovery centers around your classroom (see set-up instructions for each center). Each center will take 10-15 minutes to complete. You can have students work cooperatively or individually on each center. You may need to help each group read and interpret the instructions.
For poor readers you will need to go through each station as a class. You can choose one center each day and work through it together.
- Science as a Way of Knowing- Students follow a story and apply the various parts of the scientific method to the actions of the character in the book. Then they create a picture of the story using their imagination and art as a way of knowing the world.
- Diversity of Life- Students are presented with multiple packages filled with diverse and abundant materials-they must make a determination of which package contains the largest diversity of items and which items are the most abundant. For example one package would have various types of paper clips, another colored paper. They would count and categorize the objects.
- The Value of Wildlife- Student observer various pieces of wildlife art. Using symbols they give their opinion about three of the pieces. Then write a paragraph interpreting one piece they chose.
- Tools of the Wildlife Manager- Students explore wildlife and other animals as a way to manage problems on National Wildlife Refuges.
- Wetland Managers: Students explore 3 types of water scenarios in a wetland.
Materials Check List
- Story- Coyote and the Grass People
- Scientific Method Chart
- 10 large paper clips
- Various mini figurines of different animals.
- 5 red 1" squares of paper
- 5orange 1" squares of paper
- 5 yellow 1" squares of paper
- 5green 1" squares of paper
- 5 blue 1" squares of pape
- 10 or more works of Wildlife Art (numbered from 1-10 or more)
- Paper Opinion Tokens- heart, yuk, worth 1000 words.
- Alamosa National Wildlife Refuge- with problem descriptions affixed.
- 5 Paper Opinion Tokens- heart, yuk, worth 1000 words.
- Alamosa National Wildlife Refuge- with problem descriptions affixed.
- Critter Cards
- 5 Problem Cards
- 3 Bowls per group
- 3 3"X 6" sponges per Group
- Scissors
- Beaker with 500 Ml of water
- Journals
- Diagram and explanations
of the scientific method.
- Poker chips (three colors)
- Four flags
- Student Scavenger Hunt Sheets
- Whiteboard and marker
- Plus and Minus laminated cards for Value Line
- White Trays (1 per two students)
- Ice cube trays (1 per to students)
- Suckers and tweezers (1 per two students)
- Various pictures of birds
- Sketching paper and crayons or student journal
- 20 small paper clips