Rainforest Wildlife

Investigate how living things depend on each other for survival needs, then use color blending to make a unique rainforest landscape of animals, plants, and insects.

• 1.

  Invite students to become familiar with living things in the rainforest through books, video, and computer experiences. Working in small groups, ask students to make a list of plant and animal life in the rainforest. Discuss how plants and animals depend on each other in that natural environment.

• 2.

  On a large sheet of white paper, students outline a rainforest scene, including both plants and animals, with Crayola® Crayons.

• 3.

  With Crayola Washable Kid's Paint and Paint Brushes, mix red, blue, yellow, black, and white to blend unique colors. Encourage students to mix hues on a washable surface such as a recycled foam produce tray, or on a paper plate. Experiment to find ways to lighten and darken colors.

• 4.

  Paint over and inside the crayon outlines to illustrate a richly dense Rainforest Wildlife environment.

• 5.

  Provide an opportunity for students to present their artwork to small groups of classmates. Encourage groups to include significant information from their research in their presentation.

Standards

• LA: Read and comprehend informational texts, including history/social studies, science, and technical texts, at the high end of the grade level text complexity band independently and proficiently.
• LA: Draw evidence from literary or informational texts to support analysis, reflection, and research.
• LA: Participate in shared research and writing projects.
• LA: Engage effectively in a range of collaborative discussions (one-on-one, in groups, and teacher-led) with diverse partners on grade level topics and texts, building on others’ ideas and expressing their own clearly.
• 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.

Adaptations

• Possible classroom resources include: Over in the Jungle: A Rainforest Rhyme by Marianne Berkes; A Rainforest Habitat by Molly Aloian; The Umbrella by Jan Brett; Tropical Rainforests by Seymour Simon
• Students work in small groups to act out the movements and sounds of their animals as a dramatic response to a story about the rainforest.
• Encourage each student in the class to select a living species found in the rainforest. Children investigate the species that they have chosen and organize their research into an oral presentation for classmates.