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I am a student teacher and I created an activity for my first grade class for living and nonliving organisms. For the activity you need pictures of living and nonliving organisms, index cards, envelopes, glue sticks, chart paper and markers. The teacher glues the picture to the index cards and the puts two pictures in each envelope. The Teacher also creates a T-chart on chart paper with the headings of living and nonliving. The teacher passes the envelopes out to the students and the students have to decide if their pictures are living or nonliving. Once they have decided the students come up to the board in pairs and explain why their pictures are either living or nonliving and then glue them under the correct side of the chart paper.

Hi Samantha! Your activity is very hands on and student lead which is great in keeping the students engaged. There is so much value in having students explore on their own and then explain their reasoning. By having work in pairs to explain why they think one picture is a nonliving organism and living organism can help the teacher activate prior knowledge and see if the students have any misconceptions. Having the students explore pictures then creating the T-chart together as a group is a great way to keep everyone involved and listening. For students hearing from each other sometimes makes more sense than if a teacher were to explain it. This activity is also easy to alter to fit other topics and also easier to differentiate. Thank you for sharing your activity!

This activity is great and also very engaging for the students. Rather than have the students reading from a book about living and non living you have them going up to the board and giving evidence that supports their claim of living and non living. This is also a way to have students practicing how to communicate like scientists. I like this idea very much, I did a similar one in my first science class. Thank you for sharing this activity!