Excellent Idea

I read this article ONE TIME and could recite the kingdoms, relate them to each finger on my hand, AND explain a few things about each kingdom. That's impressive. I can't wait to teach thi... See More

I read this article ONE TIME and could recite the kingdoms, relate them to each finger on my hand, AND explain a few things about each kingdom. That's impressive. I can't wait to teach this to my students.

Fabulous Lesson!

After reading the article "A Handy Way to Teach Classification", I decided to implement the lesson in my fifth year of teaching 7th grade Life Science. In the past, my colleagues and I had ... See More

After reading the article "A Handy Way to Teach Classification", I decided to implement the lesson in my fifth year of teaching 7th grade Life Science. In the past, my colleagues and I had always worked with the students to construct Kingdom charts, comparing the characteristics of each of the 6 kingdoms (on the hand, I simply put Archae and Eubacteria on the index finger with the same spiel as the article). Never have they had such a grasp (no pun intended) on the kingdoms as when I showed them how to use their hand as their own visual aid! It is approximately a month and a half after using the hand model, and the students still refer to their fingers to determine which kingdom is next in our course of study. A fabulous lesson...it will definitely be one that I keep in my repetoir for years to come!

Fun Stuff

This is a great way to remember things, but I do wish we had 6 fingers for the 6 Kingdoms that we teach in Virginia.

Can be adapted for 6 kingdoms

I used this activity as a pre- Thanksgiving day activity. If you use this activity you can adjust it to the six kingdoms if you add a Gobbler to the turkey. Its educational and fun for the s... See More

I used this activity as a pre- Thanksgiving day activity. If you use this activity you can adjust it to the six kingdoms if you add a Gobbler to the turkey. Its educational and fun for the students. You can break the four fingers into the Eukarya kingdoms. Then put the Prokaryotes in the thumb and gobbler. I also had students write three facts about each Kingdom in the "feathers" and head and off to the side of the gobbler. The kids are enjoying the activity.

"Handy" Way to Teach Classification

This would have been a great article a few years ago...when there were only five Kingdoms, but with six Kingdoms now, this article is out of date. Other than that fact-I found the article a ... See More

This would have been a great article a few years ago...when there were only five Kingdoms, but with six Kingdoms now, this article is out of date. Other than that fact-I found the article a great way to teach classification IF there were only five Kingdoms to classify instead of the six that are currently recognized.