Zoology I, Week 2: Clam, Jellyfish, Earthworm, Fish

Here are some notes from our second week of Zoology I. This is our January main lesson block.

Zoology I, Week 1: Cuttlefish, Nautilus, Snail

Monday, January 14

• review the snail, finish remaining snail spiral mono prints
• read remainder of chapter 4 of Kovacs, "The Snail," pages 41-43 and look at relevant artifacts (moon snail shell, rasp)
• look at display of shells, compare monovalves and bivalves
• read Mollusk information on page 40 of Dennis Klocek's Drawing from the Book of Nature; discuss terms Gastropod (stomach foot), Cephalopod (head foot), and Acephalas (no heads)
• read "Gastropod - snail" information on pages 40-42 of Klocek
• add The Snail to MLB
• read "Acephalas - clam" information on pages 44-45 of Klocek
• do clam modeling activity with clay from page 45 of Klocek

I DIDN'T show this in class but there's an absolutely amazing Leopard Slug video, filmed as part of David Attenborough's Life in the Undergrowth DVD. We love David Attenborough and I highly recommend all of his documentary work! Watch it and see if it's something you'd like to share with your child. It's incredible and surprisingly beautiful. Klocek includes a drawing of slugs mating in his book, which reminded me of this, but we didn't read anything.

Tuesday, January 15

• review the clam, read "The Clam" from page 34 of Ogden Nash's Zoo
• discuss student experiences with live clams at the beach
• draw the clam following the drawing lesson in Klocek on page 45
  (note: what is pictured in figure 6.5 is a mussel and a barnacle)
• add The Clam to MLB
• introduce the jellyfish by way of doing the Jellyfish Painting Art activity from a previous blog post

We used the following liquid watercolors for our painting activity:

• Stockmar Circle Color Red
• Stockmar Orange
• Stockmar Circle Color Yellow
• Stockmar Sap Green
• Stockmar Circle Color Blue

Thursday, January 17

• finish up mollusk miscellany: look at cephalopod and ammonite fossils which a student brought in, watch video footage of a clam burrowing
• review student prior knowledge of jellyfish
• finish step 2 of jellyfish artwork
• discuss where jellyfish fall in the Timeline of Life and how much they are due our respect (scientists argue over whether the sponge or the comb jelly was THE FIRST ANIMAL ever... they are positively ancient and have survived millenia through perfect evolutionary design)
• read "Coelenterates - jellyfish and sea anemone" information on pages 38-40 of Klocek, look at Magnificent Anemone fact file card from our Coral Reef Habitat Mat
• draw jellyfish life cycle on the board and discuss
• give students time to think about their additional jellyfish questions

Friday, January 18

We had lots of extra time today since both SWI and Yoga were cancelled, so we were able to be very productive!

Morning

• review the jellyfish and its life cycle
• add jellyfish artwork to MLB
• discuss Everlasting Life: The "Immortal" Jellyfish
• watch video Jack Costello, Biologist: Why Jellyfish Swim
• collect student questions (how deep do they go, what eats them, what is the biggest / smallest jellyfish, do people eat them, do jellyfish have poison in their tentacles, do they sting each other, how long does it take for them to dehydrate, do they have gills / eyes, how do they excrete waste, do they change color, are there boy jellyfish and girl jellyfish, are they found all over the world)
• have students rough draft their jellyfish two-page spread while I looked up the answers to their questions:
  65 Stinging Facts about Jellyfish

  Nomura's jellyfish (Wikipedia)

  Jellyfish (Wikipedia)

  How Do Jellyfish Change Color?

Afternoon

• add The Jellyfish to MLB
• introduce our first two trunk animals: earthworm and fish
• discuss how the shapes of both of these animals can be drawn by drawing their habitats: earth and water
• show Leah's MLB illustrations for the earthworm and fish, look at fish from the Live Ed drawing lesson (from Animals Among the Elements)
• read "Earthworm" information on pages 36-37 of Klocek
• read "Fishes" poem for two voices from Georgia Heard's Creatures of Earth, Sea, and Sky, pages 10-11
• practice drawing earthworms and fish by leaving negative space in their environments following the drawing lesson in Klocek on page 37
• talk about earthworm facts, choose fish fact file cards from the Coral Reef Habitat Mat for each child to use for research:
  Bluestriped Fangblenny
  Bluestreak Cleaner Wrasse
  Yellowstripe Fairy Basslet
  Steephead Parrotfish
  One Spot Foxface Rabbitfish
  Emperor Angelfish
  Ocellaris Clownfish
  Blue Tang
  Bluestripe Snapper
  Pajama Cardinalfish
  Blue Ribbon Eeel
  Blacktip Reef Shark

  
  

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