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I am a student teacher and I have been working on creating a science lesson for my 1st graders on animal habitats. However, I am stuck on creating a fun hands-on activity for them to discover the different habitats. Any suggestions? I feel like I have not been able to find anything helpful on this yet. 

I would suggest you taking them outdoors. What better way to learn about animal habitats than to actually go to the animals’ habitats? Are there any trees in your school or large green areas? You can explore earthworms, butterflies, lizards, etc. This experience can then be used to extend the activity and teach them about other different animal habitats. 

One idea may be to search your local toy store or dollar store to find toy animals and plants where you could assemble a little mini habitat? I remember, as a student, completing some representations of habitats in shoe boxes. Those were fun to make and educational, as it had me consider all elements of the habitat while I created it.

Hello Laura, I am going to attach a link to the Habitat playlist on the Youtube Channel I have been developing called FunScienceDemos. This channel is home to hundreds of free, easy to use and recreate, fun science demonstrations that can help get concepts across to your students. The channel has hundreds of videos on a variety of topics, but this link will direct you to the habitat videos specifically. https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLat8Jejmdx1uDTvlTzBxuOZVrZ3DrxLjs If you like what you see, subscribe to our channel as we release new videos regularly! https://www.youtube.com/user/funsciencedemos Best, The FunScienceDemos team, Dr. George Mehler Ed.D., Temple University Jared Hottenstein Central Bucks School District

One thing that I did with my 5th graders this year was to create their own mythical creature (we'd been discussing animal adaptations and tied this in to their creature creations), and then to design a zoo habitat or enclosure that would meet the specific needs of their animal. Students then built dioramas to model the kind of habitat and needs (food / shelter / water) that their specific animal may have. The kids really got into creating their creatures (although some were pretty blatant pokemon copies!!) and loved building the dioramas. I was really surprised at their insight and creativity. - Amanda B.

Hi Laura! Animal habitats is a fun topic to teach 1st graders. I found a lot of creative ideas from Pinterest, so I suggest you check those out. One activity I recommend is splitting the students into smaller groups and giving each group a habitat to do their research on. Whether they gather the information from the books read in class or videos you show them, they can write simple notes and make a poster introducing each habitat. They can draw pictures and decorate their posters according to their specific habitat. Once each group makes their poster, they can present it to the class. This not only helps the students practice their cooperation skills, but also exercise their creativity, organization, and presentation abilities. Another habitat project they can work on is assigning each group of students a habitat and having them use different craft materials to portray their habitat on a paper plate. Good luck! This website is in Greek, but there are pictures and I got the plate idea from here http://www.shareyourlikes.gr/2012/04/06/paschalines-pedikes-kataskeves/paper-plate-spring-craft/

Hi Laura, if you still need more ideas for interactive ways to teach your students, I found this great website that the students can explore and learn independently. I think that many students are attracted to the use of the internet and computers so this will mostly likely engage them. This website also is very colorful and kid-friendly and will help introduce them to this subject! (http://interactivesites.weebly.com/habitats.html) I also found this great video that will also aid in introducing your students to this concept. (http://www.teachertube.com/video/animal-habitats-81306?utm_source=video-google&utm_medium=video-view&utm_term=video&utm_content=video-page&utm_campaign=video-view-page) There's also this lesson plan I found that invovles an interactive matching game for students to figure out and try to match animals with which habitat in which they may live in. (http://www.education.com/activity/article/Animal_Habitat_Game/)

Thank you for the link to the habitat game. It is great. I really like the idea of acting out the animal. BTW, your first link does not work. It gives a 404 error msg.

Hi Laura, This seems like such a fun lesson to do with your first graders. I would recommend purchasing some different books at their reading level about many different animals. This would be especially helpful for animals that can be found in the areas around where they live. You can then have a nature walk and have students pick out some materials that can be used for their habitats. This can include things such as leaves, sticks and dirt. Have the students bring in a shoe box or another type of box and let their imaginations go.

Hi Laura, This seems like a great idea for first graders. Are you looking for a hands-on classroom activity or something that the could do at home and then bring share with the class? I think that a good first step is to bring the students outside to examine the habitat around the school. With time to observe - and prompts about taking time to look around - your students would observe many things about the habitat right around the school. Making similar observations near home makes this a very hands-on experience, that students could share the next day (or a couple of days later) with classmates, in full-class or partner/group discussions. Best, Julie G.

Hi Laura! I definitely agree that your 1st graders will enjoy a more hands-on activity. I would suggest dividing your students into table groups and assigning them a specific animal habitat. Then, you could supply them with a strong piece of cardboard and play doh. The students would be expected to create their habitat with play doh and place it on the cardboard to display. For example, if a group was assigned the desert, they could use brown or tan play doh for the surface and try to create different animals that could reside in the desert. If play doh is too messy for your class, then you could always use construction paper and have the students draw the animals and tape it on the cardboard or poster paper. With this, you could make it a little more interesting and have students glue their animals on popsicle sticks and you could poke holes through the cardboard, so that the animals could be popsicle puppets in their habitat. Another activity could be having each group design an informational poster about their specific habitat. This would require students to use their research skills to find different facts about their habitats. Good luck!

With first graders, it could be really fun to do something very hands on outside. You could go for a nature walk around your school (if there are trees, grass, or bushes, or even just spaces in the gutters for birds nests) and look for animal habitats. What would fit in this, that or the other habitat? Every time you get to a spot, have students write what kind of animal might live in each habitat. It's also fun to sort Beanie Babies (I have so many from when I was a kid!) into categories of habitats around the room- rainforest, tundra, desert, forest, etc.

One fun idea you can do is have students create a classroom "zoo." You can use multiple plastic animals and teach students about the different habitats in the world. Then, you can have the students physically sort the plastic animals into the different habitat enclosures. You can create the "zoo" on a foam board and be as elaborate as you want with decorating it. Or even better, you can have the students draw and color the different components of the habitats in groups.

A fun idea for first graders who may not be able to go outside the classroom is to decorate various sections of the room as different habitats. Students could be in charge of designing and researching what animals live in their habitats. You may also be able to decorate different activity centers as habitats and then refer to those habitats for the remainder of the school year. This could prove to be extremely enjoyable for the first graders who now would get to read in the jungle or do their math work in the tundra.

Incorporating art into animal habitat lessons are very beneficial for the students. It allows them to create a habitat for animals based on what they have learned. It also lets you as the teacher see what they understand and what they do not understand about habitats.

I remember when I was in elementary I had to create a habitat out of a shoe box. I used construction paper, play-do and other crafty materials. It was a fun activity and at the end the class presented a mixture of different types of habitats and even in similar ones there was significant variation.