Summary
Students have been asked to create habitats for a new zoo that is opening in their community. Each group of students has been asked to create a model of a habitat for one of the chosen animals in this new zoo. In order to fit the life needs of each animal and ensure their animal will adapt, students must research their animal’s habitat and life needs. Students will also communicate with an animal expert who works at a zoo. They will develop questions to ask the zoo expert in order to ensure their habitat will help their animal adapt and survive in a zoo setting. Students must collaborate with their group to research their animal, communicate with a successful zoo expert, and build a 3-dimensional habitat model that will be presented to the “Our Community Zoo.”
TIPC Ratings
The teacher was able to facilitate students’ use of research and information to find and organize information about their chosen animal. Students selected appropriate tools to research animals, habitats, and zoo exhibits. (Using “Today’s Meet to ask the animal expert questions and websites). Students worked in groups to apply the information they gathered and come up with a plan to build their zoo exhibits.
Student groups collaborated on developing questions and connected with an animal expert outside of school to ask their top 3 most important questions. This was performed as they were building the habitats/exhibits for their animal. Students were engaged in brainstorming solutions and various ways to design their plan and compromising on the best fit zoo habitat for their given animal.
Students were engaged in a lesson where they had to gather research to solve a real world task: to design and build a zoo exhibit for their animal. Students needed to generate ideas after researching in order to work together and solve their task.
Students had the opportunity to create and present their zoo exhibit in a realistic and innovative way. Students built a 3-dimensional triorama model of their exhibit using appropriate tools, and then used ipads and/or computers. to present explain their model to a hypothetical zoo owner.
Student Artifact
Create A Zoo Project from HCPS Instructional Technology on Vimeo.
Download Files
Contents: - Lesson Plan
- Transcript of Collaborative Document with Zoo Expert
- Student Reflection
- Teacher Blog with Student Reflections
- Student Packet
