Plants, Animals, and Humans: Let's Learn about the Needs of Living Things!
- PDF
Description
Need to meet those kindergarten NGSS standards for observing and identifying patterns in plants, animals, and humans and enjoy a healthy dose of spring in your classroom? Then this is the resource for you! This resource is full of rigorous but kid-friendly printables for helping you meet the science standards by engaging your kindergarteners in an observational and hands-on science adventure where they detect the patterns in plants, animals, and humans that help them grow, survive, and thrive.
Students record in journals for each living thing and then work in venn diagrams, question sheets, and written scientists' logs to analyze patterns across those living things.
Young children are natural-born biologists and they will love this opportunity to care for and observe living things. You will relish the opportunity to take it one step farther and engage them in deep science learning as they observe, make connections, discover patterns, and find relationships in the natural world.
Through this resource, you will engage your students in:
- growing and caring for their own individual plants and keeping a plant care journal
- growing a classroom set of 5 plants, each provided with and denied different resources that are documented, and recording the results of this resource distribution on special recording sheets and analyzing the results for patterns and drawing conclusions about what this means for the needs of plants
- writing a scientist's log following a claim and evidence writing process (I think _______, because _______) using the evidence they have gathered from the above 2 experiences
- caring for and observing an animal (IF you have your own classroom pet or access to one from another classroom... I offer lots of ideas if you do not PLUS, you will find a link to a video field trip to an animal shelter included in the resource if you do not want to host a classroom pet- I TOTALLY GET IT!! If you go the video route for observation, you will also find a set of modified resources included in this package so students can still observe the animals in the video and record and get the same scientific experience without you having to deal with an animal in your classroom... it's a WIN-WIN!). Either way, kids keep an animal care journal, following a similar format to the plant care journal. What do animals need to grow, survive and thrive?
- observing their own needs and keeping a self-care journal... what do humans need to grow, survive and thrive?
- after all the observing and recording is done for all 3 groups of living things, then you begin comparing and detecting patterns- there is a question sheet, venn diagram sheets, and another scientists' log where students can now write an I think _______, because ______ piece about what they think they have discovered about the pattern of needs among living things (the heart of the standard).
- there are also resources that provide opportunity for reading (passages about the energy flow in living things based on foods eaten (a component of the NGSS) and for creative writing
- Please see the PDF preview for detailed images and information about all of the components of this resource
Standards Addressed:
K-LS1-1. Use observations to describe patterns of what plants and animals (including humans) need to survive.
LS1.C: Organization for Matter and Energy Flow in Organisms § All animals need food in order to live and grow. They obtain their food from plants or from other animals. Plants need water and light to live and grow. (K-LS1-1)
KR1: Develop and answer questions about a text. (RI)
KR2: Retell stories or share key details from a text. (RI)
KR8: Identify specific information to support ideas in a text. (RI&RL)
KW2: Use a combination of drawing, dictating, oral expression, and/or emergent writing to name a familiar topic and supply information.
KW6: Develop questions and participate in shared research and exploration to answer questions and to build and share knowledge. (scientific observation and exploration)
What's Included:
1) A Table of Contents, making resource selection seamless and easy!
2) Materials List
3) Clear and detailed directions (16 pages) explaining each element of the resource package and how to best use it in conjunction with the experiments and within the context of the science standards
4) Video Link to a quality, kid-friendly video about a field trip to an animal shelter- this is meant primarily for those classrooms who do not have or do not wish to have access to a firsthand animal observation experience, however it could also be used to complement a firsthand observation experience (this IS a publicly available video but I curated it, connected it to the standards, and created alternative resources for it- included- for classrooms that do NOT have a pet)
5) Plant Care Journal- Trifold Booklet (student sheet)
6) Pet Care Journal- Trifold Booklet (specific to firsthand, in classroom observation and care of an animal) (student sheet)
7) Pet Care Journal- Trifold Booklet (specific to video observation of someone caring for animals) (student sheet)
8) Self Care Journal- Trifold Booklet (student sheet)
9) Square Venn Diagram Comparing the Needs of Living Things- Plants, Animals, Humans (student sheet)
10) Circle Venn Diagram Comparing the Needs of Living Things- Plants, Animals, Humans (student sheet)
11) Observing Patterns in Living Things Question Sheet (student sheet)
12) Observing the Needs of Plants Recording Sheet (version 1) (student sheet)
13) Observing the Needs of Plants Recording Sheet (version 2) (student sheet)
14) Labels for seed growing cups (teacher sheet)
15) Scientist’s Log- Observing the Needs of Plants (student sheet)
16) Scientist’s Log- Observing the Needs of Living Things (student sheet)
17) Plant Themed Inch Rulers (student tool)
18) Needs of Animals Graphic Organizer (student sheet)
19) Energy Flow in Living Things Graphic Organizer (student sheet)
20) RAFT Writing Paper- From a plant to the sun (student sheet)
21) RAFT Writing Paper- From a dog to a caregiver (student sheet)
22) RAFT Writing Paper- From a cat to a caregiver (student sheet)
23) RAFT Writing Paper- From a generic pet (themed clipart) to a caregiver (student sheet)
24) RAFT Writing Paper- From a fish to a caregiver (student sheet)
25) RAFT Writing Paper- From a generic pet or even a human child (heart clipart) to a caregiver (student sheet)
26) Reading Passages- each has a version WITH a challenging vocabulary word and a version without that word. All highlight how these living things get the energy they need and all have images with text at the bottom. The Needs of Plants passage also has a version with an image for the word “air” being a sky and another with the image being a “balloon” so you have some choice there since this is a more nebulous concept.
- 4 Needs of Plants Passages- 2 with sky images, 1 with the word “producer,” 1 without; and 2 with a balloon image, with the word “producer,” 1 without
- 2 Needs of Rabbits Passages- 1 with the word “herbivore” and 1 without
- 2 Needs of Humans Passages- 1 with the word “omnivore” and 1 without
- 2 Needs of Other Living Things Passages- 1 with the word “carnivore” and 1 without
Please note: the duration of instruction is listed as 1 month, but this depends on the types of seeds you choose (i.e. how long they take to sprout and grow), how long you choose to observe each living thing, and whether you observe each living thing sequentially or at the same time. When I did this in the classroom, I generally took about 3-5 weeks to do it. This was a fair amount of time so I did not overwhelm students with the process and so that I did not devote too much time to this unit of study over others.
Thank you for considering this product. I truly think you and your students will have so much fun exploring plant, animal, and human needs together. I hope you will find this works for you!
If you are looking for other science resources for your students, please check out the science section of my store for great tools for young scientists:
