Amazing Amazon Life

1. Display a map of the Amazon River Basin and the Amazon Rainforest. Have students research information about the region - its flora, fauna, characteristics, climate, threats to its sustainability, etc. Ask them to choose six creatures to learn about and illustrate.
2. Have students cut out six white squares of paper. On each piece ask them to draw and label one of the creatures they selected and add illustrating details about their environment.
3. Ask students to arrange and glue the six pictures on posterboard. They can illustrate the outer edge of the poster to unify the display.
4. Have them present their art and some facts about the rainforest creatures they depicted.

SCI: Convey designs through sketches, detailed drawings, or physical models to communicate ideas and solutions.

SCI: Explore similarities and differences in patterns and use them to sort, classify, communicate, and analyze natural phenomena and change.

SS: People, Places, and Environments: Use maps, globes, and other geographic tools. Demonstrate understanding of the use and misuse of the environment and the relationship between human populations and the physical world. 

SS: People, Places, and Environments: Understand various perspectives and examine changes in relationship between peoples, places, and environments.

There are at least 17 animals that live only in the Amazon Rainforest and nowhere else on Earth. Students can learn what they are and create an illustrated display of what they found out.

Students can prepare a "news report" for the class about the effects of climate change on the world's rain forests and what can be done to help.