Tropical Dreamscape

1. As a whole class activity, ask students to compile a list of animals that live in tropical climates. Then determine a list of questions they have about these animals. Post the animal list and questions on a classroom white board using Crayola Dry Erase Markers.
2. Organize students into small groups. Each group will select an animal from the class list to research, focusing on finding answers to all class questions and adding several interesting facts about their selected animal to the research.
3. Once research is complete, students groups will create a Tropical Dreamscape on large white drawing paper. In the foreground use black Crayola® Washable Markers to draw overlapping tropical vines, plants, flowers, and trees. Encourage students to add detailed patterns to trunks and stems.
4. Use a marker to outline the animal hidden behind illustrated foreground foliage.
5. Separate the background and foreground of the environment (such as plants, mountains, sky) with horizontal wavy marker lines.
6. Use Crayola Markers in tropical colors to fill in your foreground elements, background divisions, and hidden animal.
7. Provide time in the day for student groups exchange drawings with other groups. Challenge each to locate and identify the hidden animals. What graphic techniques did the artists use to hide their animals? Ask groups to discuss the interesting facts uncovered about their animals.

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: Determine the main idea of a text and explain how it is supported by key details; summarize the text.

LA: Write routinely over extended time frames (time for research, reflection, and revision) and shorter time frames (a single sitting or a day or two) for a range of discipline-specific tasks, purposes, and audiences.

LA: Report on a topic or text, tell a story, or recount an experience with appropriate facts and relevant, descriptive details, speaking clearly at an understandable pace.

SCI: Make observations of plants and animals to compare the diversity of life in different habitats[

SCI: Make a claim about the merit of a solution to a problem caused when the environment changes and the types of plants and animals that live there may change.

SCI: Obtain and combine information to describe that energy and fuels are derived from natural resources and their uses affect the environment.

SS: Observe and speculate about social and economic effects of environmental changes and crises resulting from phenomena such as floods, storms, and drought.

SS: Examine the interaction of human beings and their physical environment, the use of land, building of cities, and ecosystem changes in selected locales and regions.

SS: Identify and use various sources for reconstructing the past, such as documents, letters, diaries, maps, textbooks, photos, and others.

VA: Use different media, techniques, and processes to communicate ideas, experiences, and stories.

VA: Select and use subject matter, symbols, and ideas to communicate meaning.

Possible classroom resources include: Tropical Rainforests by Seymour Simon; Tropical Rain Forests (True Books: Ecosystems) by Darlene R. Stille; Tropical Rainforests (Habitats) by Robert Snedden.

Students focus their research energies on a specific animal or plant in the rainforest. Is this organism endangered? If so, how has the rainforest environment changed and why? Students write an original poem focused on the animal or plant researched. Incorporate research into the poem. Illustrate the poem for display using Crayola Colored Pencils.

A day in the life of an animal in the rainforest is a mystery unless you live in the rainforest, too. Students investigate rainforests and what the climate is like. Write a short story, from the perspective of the rainforest animal. Students should be prepared to present their stories to classmates.