Year 4 Science Living Things & their Habitats – Block 4LvH – Name That Living Thing!
Session 6: I’m thinking of a living thing….Science curriculum area: Living Things / i. recognise that living things can be grouped in a variety of ways
ii. explore and use classification keys to help group, identify and name a variety of living things in their local and wider environment
Working Scientifically (LKS2) / i. using straightforward scientific evidence to answer questions or to support their findings
Teaching Objectives / · To create and use a classification key to name a variety of living things in the wider environment.
Other Curriculum areas / English
· discuss what they are learning and to develop their wider skills in spoken language
· use language in a greater variety of situations, for a variety of audiences and purposes, including through drama, formal presentations and debate
Teaching Objectives / · To explain to a younger audience how to group living things and to lead them in a questioning game.
Key Vocabulary question, classify, group, teach
Resources
Guess Who PowerPoint, Guess Who resource sheet / Weblinks
http://www.woodlandtrust.org.uk/naturedetectives/activities/2015/09/leaf-id/ - Leaf ID PDF.
Whole Class: Before this session, mount and display their large collaborative insect drawings and their smaller drawings. If possible, display their photos from Session 2 as well. Print 2 copies of the Guess Who resource for every child in the class and cut out all of the living things so they appear like cards.
Recap with the class some of the things they have learnt throughout this unit. Assess their understanding. Show the Guess Who slide of the PowerPoint (session resource). Have one set of the images of the living things from the resource lying upside down on the table in front of you. Select one child to come and choose one card. They are not to show you which living thing is on the card, but they can show it to the rest of the class. Model the thought processes needed to begin the necessary classification questions. ‘Hhhmmm, some are plants and some are animals. Some things live in water. There are some insects. Some things are big and some are small.’ Ask the selected child to take a seat in the ‘hot-seat’. Begin to ask them some yes/no questions that will eliminate the wrong living things and lead you to the correct living thing. If you need to demonstrate this more clearly, have the slide on edit mode and physically move the eliminated living things of the screen to show how you are thinking. Once you’ve got the right answer, choose another child to select a card and sit in the hot seat. This time, choose 2 other children to do the questioning. Assess their understanding. Periodically stop the questions and get each table to discuss with each other what they think the next question should be – take feedback.
Activities:
Chn work independently to write a branching database that will identify all the living things from the slide. Explain that you are looking for use of scientific language: habitat, invertebrate, mammal. They should draw the living thing at the end of the corresponding branch. Move between them and assess their understanding.
Extension Task:
Chn also write a dichotomous classification key for the leaf ID PDF.
When they’ve finished their independent task, get them to play ‘Guess Who?’ with a partner. Both children have a set of living things cards each (images from the resource). Without their partner seeing, they draw one card – that is who they are. They then lay all of their cards (including the one selected) in front of them face-up. One child begins by asking a yes/no question to their opponent to try to work out which living thing they are. Depending on the answer, the children turn the eliminated cards facedown. They take it in turns to question each other until one child is certain and is able to say which living thing their partner is.
Plenary / Explain that chn in Year 2 also learn about living things, but Year 2 children don’t have to sort them into different groups as scientifically as they have been learning in Year 4. Tell them that they will be going to Year 2 to teach them some of the things they have learnt and to play ‘Guess Who?’ with them. Explain that Year 2 may not sort the living things as scientifically as they do, they might focus on the size of the living things, or the colour – but that’s ok as living things can be sorted in a variety of ways. With a partner, the Year 4 chn should work with 2 Year 2 chn. First they should spend time sorting the living things into different groups – however the younger children want. Give them a minute, then ask them to sort them differently. Repeat this a couple of times. The children should then make two teams, each team of one Year 2 and one Year 4, and play ‘Guess Who?’ against each other.
Outcomes / Children will
· Write a branching database for a variety of living things from the wider world
· Test their classification key by playing ‘Guess Who?’
· Demonstrate an understanding of their learning by explaining it to others
© Original resource copyright Hamilton Trust, who give permission for it to be adapted as wished by individual users.
We refer you to our warning, at the foot of the block overview, about links to other websites.