Its Week 4 of Ranger Stu's Virtual Zoo. I hope you all have had a wonderful Easter weekend, we are back into the swing of things with habitats!
When I'm visiting schools with my animals I'm often asked to present a talk on a habitat. Most of the time it is the rainforest habitat (Covered in week 1 of Ranger Stu's Virtual Zoo.) but the second most popular habitat covered in my school talks is deserts!
On Wednesday I will be posting a video on my YouTube channel (subscribe here!) all about Habitats, featuring an animal from a rainforest, a desert, a river and a woodland! So do not miss out on this weeks video!
So what is a habitat?
Every environment that an animal lives in is its habitat. A habitat will be able to provide shelter, food, water and other animals, including its own kind.
There are hundreds of different habitats throughout the world. It could be a freezing land of ice in the arctic or an extremely hot desert of sand in central Australia, it could be a rainforest full of trees or a lake full of reeds and algae!
Habitats can also change, this could be naturally due to earthquakes or eruptions from volcanoes or sadly it could be man made such as when a rainforest has its trees cut down (Deforestation).
Now we know what a habitat is, here are your weekly tasks!
EYFS - Create a habitat
So for this task I am assuming you will have some boxes around, it could be a cereal box or an Easter egg box.
You will need...
An empty box
Scissors
Paint or Crayons
Scrap paper
Glue
Think about which habitat you would like to recreate, think of the animals found in that habitat.
If there isn't already a large hole in the front of the box then ask an adult to cut out a large hole for you.
Colour the inside of the box to resemble the habitat you want create, if you wish you can colour or paint the outside of the box also.
Use scrap card or paper to create the plants and animals that live in your habitat, cut them out and glue them onto the box. The best part about using a box is that you can make the habitat 3D!
As an example here is a Woodland habitat box that I made with my son, it has a woodpecker, a hedgehog and a skunk. We even used parts of an egg crate to create rocks inside the box.
KS1 and KS2 - Match an animal to its habitat
Here is a really great work sheet from Twinkl and you can download it for free! (during lockdown you can create a free account!)
Print off the habitats sheet above. Your task is to match the animals to their habitats. Learn a bit more about each animal in the pictures and think about what each animal would need from a habitat? Would a penguin prefer to be in a rainforest or on the ice?
If you don’t have a printer then how about drawing your favourite animals and thinking about which habitat they would prefer to be in.
Have fun!
You can post pictures of your created box habitats and anything else through my Facebook and Instagram or you can post them in the comments section below.
Want to enjoy more Ranger Stu content?
Why not take a look at Ranger Stu's Virtual Zoo, live animals visiting your classroom, scout group or organisation virtually!
The great thing about Ranger Stu’s Virtual Zoo is that this can take place at any school or educational group within the U.K. or even the world!
Find out more on the link below and get in touch today for availability and pricing.