CONSERVATION LESSON PLAN
Name(s): Travis Lara
Title of Lesson: Water & Animal Conservation
Date of Lesson: April 1 & 2, 2005
Length of Lesson: 1:15 Ð 1:30 hour
Description of the Class:
Source of the Lesson:
The lesson was made in part from Project Wild: Aquatic copyright 1987.
TEKS Addressed:
(a) Introduction.
(1) In Grade 8, the study of science includes planning and conducting field and laboratory investigations using scientific methods, analyzing data, critical-thinking, scientific problem-solving, and using tools such as telescopes to collect and analyze information.
(2) As students learn science skills, they identify the roles of both human activities and natural events in altering Earth systems.
(5) Science is a way of learning about the natural world.
(6) A system is a collection of cycles, structures, and processes that interact.
(7) Investigations are used to learn about the natural world.
(b) Knowledge and skills.
(1) Scientific processes. The student conducts field and laboratory investigations using safe, environmentally appropriate, and ethical practices. The student is expected to:
(A) demonstrate safe practices during field and laboratory investigations; and
(B) make wise choices in the use and conservation of resources and the disposal or recycling of materials.
The lesson will focus on pollution, viewed both in water as well as how it affects animals in the water, and how conservation actions could change the outcome of the inhabitants and their surroundings.
The student will be able to: Identify major sources of aquatic pollution, make inferences about the potential effects of a variety of aquatic pollutants on wildlife and wildlife habitats, and view how pollution can affect energy transfers in a food chain.
Class set of clipboards
Manilla construction paper (one for each student)
Crayons, Markers, & Pencils
Ten different colors of construction paper (2 sheets each)
Graph Paper
Scotch tape or glue
1/4 teaspoon measure
One water field test kit (one group investigating phosphates; other nitrates)
IV. Safety Considerations
In dealing with the field test kit, the students need to be aware of what is involved with using the field test kit and the chemicals that help them figure out the data that they need.
V. Supplementary Materials, Handouts
Five E Organization
| Engage: Build your dream beach. Questions: What do you see happening on your beach? What would happen if I included my perfect beach? |
Students are asked to draw their own dream beach and then put them together to see the consequences of their actions. Answers: (Response will vary due to what the students build on their beach) (My beach includes a landfill; responses will come out after the students see) |
Students will show interest in the pollution of the beach and will be ready to proceed.
| Explore: Go through Deadly waters activity. Questions: What was the highest concentration of pollutant in your river? What pollutant would be considered damaging to the wildlife habitat? |
Students should be able to go through the virtual river and see what toxins reside in the river that they created as well as see how polluted their river actually is. Answers: (Depending upon the findings in the river, results may vary) Anything over 2 units of each kind would be considered damaging to the environment. |
Circulate and check students' progress through lesson. See if they have any problems or concerns.
| Explain: Do experiment with water field test kit and check pollutants at the salt marsh. Questions: What level of phosphates do you see? What level of nitrates are present in the water? |
Students should be able to go through the experiment and notice the levels of phosphates and nitrates in the water at the salt marsh. Answers: Dependent upon levels in the marsh, results will be determined on the day. |
See if they actually understood the concepts that were portrayed in the lab.
| Extend/Elaborate: Discussion of how water pollutants play a part in animal food chains and animal habitats. Questions: Do pollutants play a role in the energy transfer between animals? Is this just an isolated incident or could one see this happening to other places besides water habitats? |
Students are asked to draw from the lab's interaction and see how the habitat directly affects the lives of the organisms in that environment. Answers: Pollutants directly affect the energy transfer in food chains. There is nothing isolating about the effects of pollution on the environment. |
Evaluate
Students should be able to draw conclusions from this activity and think about pollution on the world's stage.
Deadly Waters
Steps:
1) List the four major categories of pollution (chemical, thermal, organic, and ecological). Refer to the background for a description of each. NOTE: The first three are dominantly caused by humans, although there are rare cases where natural processes can cause them. Ecological pollution is typically natural, although there are cases where it is caused by humans.
2) Pass out the Pollutant Information Sheets. Review each kind of pollution with the students. Talk about how some of these can fit into more than one of the four kinds of pollution. Color code each with different color of construction paper. Wire a short description of the pollution on a piece of the paper of the color to which it is coded. Post each sheet of colored paper with its corresponding description of the kind of pollution it represents in a row in a convenient place.
3) Once all the kinds of pollution have been discussed, and the students understand that each kind of pollution will be represented in this activity by one color of paper, tell the students that they are to divide into teams of three. These will be research teams; each team will analyze the pollution content of a hypothetical river. Distribute the colored paper tokens that have been punched from the construction paper. Provide ¼ teaspoon of the paper-punched tokens to each research team. Also provide each team with a piece of graph paper.
4) The teams must then separate the colored tokens into piles; using the color key, they should identify each type of pollutant. Once this is done, they should count the number of each kind of pollutant they have identified and then use graph paper to construct a simple bar graph showing the whole array of pollutants. Remind the students that they each have a different river. Their results are not likely to be the same!
5) Compare the two teams' results and tell them that any quantity above two units of each kind of pollutant is considered damaging to wildlife habitat.