King of Beasts

Lions are awesome animals! With Crayola® Erasable Colored Pencils, draw one of these regal creatures, partially hidden by its surroundings.

1.

Read about lions. Watch them live on the Internet or visit a zoo or wild animal park. These beautiful cats truly are kings of beasts. Find out about lions' natural habits and habitats. Research what, and how much, lions eat every day. What else do they need to be comfortable and content? How do zoos try to provide lions and other wild animals with more natural surroundings?
2.

Use Crayola® Erasable Colored Pencils to draw a lion. Show the male's bushy, handsome mane. Both males and females have whiskers and a graceful tail. What do their eyes and noses look like?
3.

Decide whether to show your lion in its natural habitat or in a circus or zoo. Erase lines in your picture to resemble the lion roaming through vegetation or standing behind cage bars. This is the foreground. Color the background setting in which you chose to show the King of Beasts.

Standards

LA: Ask and answer such questions as who, what, where, when, why, and how to demonstrate understanding of key details in a text.
LA: Use information gained from the illustrations and words in a print or digital text to demonstrate understanding of its characters, setting or plot.
LA: Know and apply grade-level phonics and word analysis skills in decoding words.
LA: Read with sufficient accuracy and fluency to support comprehension.
LA: Participate in shared research and writing projects.
LA: Tell a story or recount an experience with appropriate facts and relevant, descriptive details, speaking audibly in coherent sentences.
SCI: Develop and use models to compare how living things depend on their surroundings to meet their needs in the places they live.
SCI: Design a solution to a problem caused when a habitat changes and some of the plants and animals may no longer be able to live there.
SS: Use appropriate resources, data sources, and geographic tools to generate, manipulate, and interpret information.
SS: Explore causes, consequences, and possible solutions to persistent, contemporary, and emerging global issues, such as pollution and endangered species.
VA: Use different media, techniques, and processes to communicate ideas, experiences, and stories.
VA: Use visual structures of art to communicate ideas.

Possible classroom resources include: The Lion and the Mouse by Jerry Pinkney; Lazy Lion (African Animal Tales) by Mweyne Hadithi; Magic Tree House Fact Tracker #26: Pandas and Other Endangered Species by Mary Pope Osbourne & Natalie Pope Boyce; Gone Wild by David McLimans; The Best Book of Endangered and Extinct Animals by Christiane Gunzi; Can We Save Them? Endangered Species of North America by David Dobson; Almost Gone: The World's Rarest Animals by Steve Jenkins
Using Crayola Model Magic, students create 3-D sculptures of lions. Students paint their sculptures and compose a short summary of what they have learned about this species of animals. Display the 3-D sculptures with the summaries.
Invite a local zookeeper to speak with the class about running a zoo and caring for large animals such as lions. Also ask the guest to discuss what is being done for endangered species. Students write questions for the zookeeper prior to the visit. Afterwards, students participate in small group discussions sharing what they have learned.
How does an animal get put on the endangered species list? Students investigate this question and propose possible actions humans can take to assist in protecting lion species from becoming extinct.
Students create a triarama of a lion in its natural habitat. Use 3-D sculptures in the triaramas.