Activities for learning

Activities that can be used in the classroom or extracurricular clubs are listed below. Email Carrie Yaniko at cyanikolawswcd@zoominternet.net to have the activities presented in your classroom or at your extracurricular event. You may also borrow the kit.

Activities available:

• The Salamander Room: Preschool-grade 3
  Using the book, The Salamander Room by Anne Mazer, and learning kit props, the sutdents will turn Brian's "room" into a salamander paradise and find out that animals need diverse places to live.
  Objectives: Discover that wild animals need diverse habitats to survive; Consider the consequences of providing a home for a wild animal; Appreciate the diversity of natural habitats.
  
• Ad-libbed Aliens: Grades 2-8
  Students will invent crazy plants and animals as they put together new combinations of nouns, verbs and adjectives. They will be amazed when you introduce real living creatures that have adaptations as bizarre as the ones they have created.
  Objectives: Recognize that invasive species are equipped with adaptations that give them competitive advantages over native species; Become familiar with kudzu, leafy spurge and snakehead fish.
  
• Bioblunder Tribunal: Grades 9-adult
  Students will hold moch trials to determine if the indiviuals or groups responsible for introducing invasive species should be held accountable for their actions. Through this process, they will discover the long-lasting and far-reaching consequences of non-native plant and animal introductions.
  Objectives: Recognize that people introduce invasive species by accident and on purpose; Realize that the introduction of invasive species is tied to human actions, specifically travel, trade and transportation; Realize that decisions we make today can have far-reaching consequences
  
• Super Alien: Grades 5-12
  Students will meet Hydrilla, the perfect aquatic plant, through a short presentation with props. Then they will have the chance to create their own super plant that has everything it needs for a successful invasion.
  Objectives: List common adaptations of invasive aquatic plants; Illustrate an invasive plant that is adapted to invade an aquatic ecosystem.
  
• Rival for Survival: Grades 5-8
  Invasive species have wreaked havoc in the Great Lakes and other inland waters. As kids work their way around the game board, they can test their knowledge of invasive species and discover ways they can prevent further introductions of invasives.
  Objectives: Give examples of native, non-native, invasive and introduced aquatic species; Identify some of the impacts non-native invasive species on aquatic ecosystems; Recognize the role of individuals in managing the spread of invasive species.
  
• Web of Life: Grades 3-8
  In this simulation game, students represent plants and animals living in an aquatic habitat. Sitting in a circle, they connect themselves to each other using string to represent the ways they depend on each other. As they make connections, the string forms a visual web of life. Then, they will experience what happens when an invasive species enters their watery world.
  Objectives: Describe an aquatic food web; Identify the connections between plants and animals in an aquatic ecosystem; Explain how the introduction of an invasive species impacts an aquatic food web.
  
• Outwit-Outplant-Outlast: Grades 5-10
  When students play the parts of native plants, invasive plants and herbivores, they quickly see the advantages that invasives have over natives. The invasives need fewer resources and reproduce a lot faster than their native competitors. In fact, it won't take many "seasons" for a few invasives to displace the native plants and take over the playing field.
  Objectives: Experience the vulnerabilities of native species, such as competition, predation, and dependence on nutrients, water and space; List reasons why invasive species have a competitive advantage over native species, such as longer growing season, lower nutrient requirements and lack of predators; Chart the advancement of invasives as they spread throughout a natural area.
  
• Meadow in a Can: Grades 9-adult
  Over the years, gardeners, landscapers and nursery owners have allowed many plant species to escape into natural habitats. Often people don't realize they are cultivating and caring for a potentially invasive plant until it is too late. Using seed packets and nursery ads, students will practice being cautious consumers and decide if they should plant a seed mix in their location.
  Objectives: Analyze the species selection process and marketing strategies used by companies producing seed mixes; Identify the contents of wildflower seed mixes; Become aware that consumers must be well-informed when purchasing plant material from garden centers, nurseries and seed companies.
  
• Means and Modes: Grades 9-adult
  Most invasive species are incredible adaptable and can take advantage of opportunities for invasion. However, they rarely swim across oceans, wlak over mountain ranges, or hop continents without help from people! A box full of "teasers" will help students figure out ways that people knowingly and unknowingly assist invasive plants and animals.
  Objectives: List everyday activities that can contribute to the spread of invasive species; Realize that people spread invasive species both knowingly and unknowingly; Analyze personal actions related to the introduction and spread of invasive species.
  
• Biodiversity Index: Grades 6-12
  Scientists don't have time to identify and count every plant in an area. Instead, they have developed sampling techniques that allow them to compare the diversity of different habitats. Students will use similar sampling techniques in nearby parks, backyards and natural areas to measure the effects of invasives on biodiversity. They will also begin an herbarium collection of invasive plants.
  Objectives: Realize that scientists use sampling techniques to measure biodiversity; Calculate the Diversity Index of plants along a transect line; Understand the importance of diversity indexes in measuring the success of invasive species control methods.