Curriculum

Students use salad tongs, tweezers and other tools to discover the relationship between the shape of a bird's beak, its habitat and diet.

What color are sea stars? Where do crabs hide? Students observe animals and look for different colors and locations using preposition cards. They collect data and share their findings.

What makes sea otters and seals unique marine mammals? Students play a game with information cards to compare and review the characteristics of seals and otters.

How do crabs stay alive in their habitats? Students use crab picture cards, construct a hermit crab model and experiment with household utensils to see how different kinds of crabs eat and protect themselves.

How do fish protect themselves in the ocean? One adaptation is camouflage. Students make a paper fish and "camouflage" it into a magazine photo habitat.

What are the differences between tides and waves? Students find out by creating a model tide pool in a plastic dishpan. They then construct clay animals and experiment with water levels and waves.

How does the size of your hand compare to the size of a book or desk? Students estimate the size of various objects using non-standard measurement, such as a paper "hand" or piece of yarn.

How do birds stay warm? By experimenting with ice and baggies of feathers, students discover feathers are an important adaptation for birds.

How do animals survive at the rocky shore? Students learn about two kinds of molluscs and examine, sort and make models of shells.

What is hidden in the sand? Students uncover paper animals buried in a sand box and use them in a series of language art challenges.

What do sea otters do all day? Students find out by reading about sea otters then creating a paper bag puppet to learn about sea otter behavior and body parts.

What kind of an animal is a penguin? Students learn about penguin characteristics and then use penguin pictures as manipulatives to practice and reinforce various math concepts.

What do reduce, reuse and recycle really mean? Students sort various objects into trash, yard waste and recycling. They learn to reduce the amount of trash they produce and then reuse by making instruments from recycled materials.

What creates ocean waves? Students use various tools to experiment with wind strength and create waves in a model ocean. They then predict and test the effect of waves on a rocky shore habitat.

What makes a fish different from other animals? Students examine the external parts of a store-bought fish. They use anatomical clues to decipher where their fish lives and what its lifestyle might be.

Students learn about an animal's habitat and physical structures and write their observations on paper "bubbles." Students then use the "bubbles" to create language arts projects.

Students choose pieces of ocean animal puzzles with investigation topics. In small groups, they record information about their animal's habitat and adaptations. Then they share their data to complete their "puzzles."

Students make observations of ocean animals and habitats in Aquarium exhibits, on web cams or in other nonfiction resources. The students then use their findings to write and illustrate poems.

What is a seahorse? Where does it live? Students learn about seahorse adaptations then match photos of seahorses to their correct habitats.

What do you call a baby seahorse? Students listen to a rhyme and sequence cards depicting the stages of a seahorse life cycle.

What does a seahorse have in common with a kangaroo? Student pairs use simile cards to discover seahorse adaptations and characteristics.

How easy is hazardous waste to clean up? In this simulation, students are challenged to find and remove a "baking soda contaminant" from a plastic shoebox filled with damp sand.

How are beaches formed? Students construct a beach in a pan and investigate the effects of wind and waves on a beach.

How do different fish survive in their habitats? Students use a fish body part key to "decode" a fish and infer behavior and habitat.

What is seaweed? Why is it in ice cream? Students find out by exploring the characteristics of seaweed. They then make seaweed extract and use it to create ice cream.

Where does sand come from? Students observe characteristics of sand grains and find other students with matching sand samples. Students then use the provided latitude and longitude to find their beach on a map.

How did the leopard shark get its spots? Students read creation myths to learn about various cultural explanations for natural phenomena. Then students write their own myth about an ocean animal.

What makes a shark a shark? Students explore shark anatomy by taking part in a debate justifying the importance of specific shark adaptations and physical characteristics.

What affects the health of a watershed? By constructing a shower curtain model, students explore how human actions influence a watershed.

What challenges do sharks face in the wild? Students learn about those challenges and design a shark cartoon with a conservation message.

What happens when plastics enter the ocean? Students explore the density and buoyancy of different plastics. They then predict how plastics affect marine food webs and brainstorm actions to reduce marine debris.

Using a prefix and suffix chart, students "translate" a shark's scientific name to discover its meaning and create drawings based on their findings.

What are the components of an ecosystem? Students assume the roles of different scientists while collecting data at an outdoor field site or aquarium.

How do human actions contribute to climate change? Students investigate their individual or household carbon dioxide emissions using an online calculator, then discuss ways to reduce their carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gas emissions.

Students use blue film glasses to observe camouflage strategies of deep sea organisms and explore the properties of light in water.

What is pH and how does carbon dioxide released from the burning of fossil fuels increase the acidity of the ocean? Students find out by doing a serial dilution to create their own pH scale. Then they add carbon dioxide to fresh water and sea water and use their pH scale to analyze results.