Lesson 2
What Do Animals Need and
Where Do They Live?
STUDENT SKILLS:
observing, sorting, inferring, communicating, identifying, illustrating, comparing,
synthesizing
Lesson 2: What Do Animals Need and Where Do They Live?
Activity 2A:
The Basic Needs of Animals
SUMMARY: Students will explore and identify the five basic needs of animals.
KIT MATERIALS:
TEACHER TO PROVIDE:
Animal models
Copies of MySci™ Journal page
Missouri Department of Conservation Water
habitats and animals posters
Basic needs cards (class set)
Post-it notes
Strainers
Plastic fish
Plastic worms
2 plastic containers
Plastic cups
Tweezers
Soil
ENGAGE
Tell your class that they will work in teams of two with their neighbors. Go around the room
and have one member from each team pull an animal model from the bag and a basic needs
card from the stack. Tell the student to discuss how the animal they have chosen fulfills the
need written on the card, i.e. how does the bird get its food.
Once the teams have discussed their animal, each team can share their animal, its needs, and
how they think their animal gets what it needs.
If time and space permits, each team could act out what they discussed and have the other
teams guess their animal and need.
EXPLORE
Take your smaller teams of two and put them together to form four large groups. Assign each
group one of the four Missouri Department of Conservation habitat posters. Have each group
investigate their assigned poster. Ask them to look for as many animals as they can find in the
poster. Label each animal they find in the poster with a post-it note.
Once all the animals are found, have the students investigate what the animals are doing in the
poster. Tell the students to keep in mind the following questions as they investigate:
Which animals are up on land in their poster?
Which animals are under water in their poster?
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TM
What Is an Animal?
Lesson 2: What Do Animals Need and Where Do They Live?
How do land animals get what they need up on land?
How do aquatic animals get what they need underwater?
EXPLAIN
Write the following titles up on the board: forest, prairie, wetland, and river. Explain that
these are the four titles of the posters under investigation. Have the forest group hold up their
poster. Ask the group to give the names of two of the land animals they labeled and what the
animals were doing in the poster. Write their responses up on the board under forest. Have
the prairie group do the same. Now move to the wetland group and ask for two aquatic
animals that were labeled and what they were doing. Do the same with the river group.
Ask the class how land animals are different from aquatic animals in the ways they get what
they need.
Explain to the class that no matter what kind of animal they found in their posters, all animals
have five basic needs. Ask the students what they think those five basic needs are for animals.
Explain that although different animals may need different things, all animals have five basic
needs to stay alive. Those basic needs include food, water, shelter, space, and oxygen.
NOTE TO TEACHER: Often students may include answers such as love,
parents, a home, clothes, etc. Remind the students animals may need many
different things to survive. The five needs addressed in this activity are those
that every animal needs simply to stay alive.
Air is often an answer given. This is not completely correct since many
animals are found underwater and do not require air for breathing. Ask the
students where fish live and how they breathe. Ask the students what is in
air and water that help fish and birds stay alive.
ELABORATE
Set up the bird investigation stations and divide your students into four groups.
Station 1: Water Birds
Tell the students that in this activity they will get a chance to find food in ways similar to birds
that get their food from the water. Students will pretend they are birds and use their beaks
(strainers) to pick up food (plastic fish) and place it in their stomachs (plastic cup). Remind
the students that they can only use their beaks to catch and move the fish.
Station 2: Land Birds
Tell the students that in this activity they will get a chance to find food in ways similar to birds
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What Is an Animal?
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Lesson 2: What Do Animals Need and Where Do They Live?
that get their food on land. Students will pretend they are birds and use their beaks (tweezers)
to catch food (plastic worms) and place it in their stomachs (plastic cup). Remind the students
that they can only use their beaks to catch and move the worms.
Once every group has had a chance to investigate, ask the students the following questions:
Did both birds need food?
Did both birds get their food the same way?
How did the birds in station 1 get their food?
How did the birds in station 2 get their food?
In which poster might they find the birds in station 1?
In which poster might they find the birds in station 2?
EVALUATE
Have the students write/draw in their MySci™ Journal the basic needs of an animal. Older
students will write/draw how their animal gets its needs met.
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TM
What Is an Animal?
Lesson 2: What Do Animals Need and Where Do They Live?
Activity 2B:
The Importance of Habitats
SUMMARY: Students will investigate and discuss the importance of an animal’s habitat to its survival.
KIT MATERIALS:
MDC habitats and animals posters
A Pill Bug’s Life book by John
Himmelman
Hand lenses
Spray bottle
Petri dishes
Pill bugs (to be given out at
Investigation Station)
TEACHER TO PROVIDE:
Copies of MySci™ Journal page
Organic material (leaves, wood, etc.)
ENGAGE
Explain to the class that they will be visited by a mystery animal known as a pill bug.
Distribute a MySci™ Journal page and ask the students to draw what they think a pill bug
might look like when they see it. If the students think they know what a pill bug is, ask them
to draw it as well. Ask the children to share their drawings with each other.
Divide the class into three groups. Give each group a Petri dish containing three pill bugs.
Have the students compare their drawing to the pill bugs in the Petri dishes.
Read the book A Pill Bug’s Life by John Himmelman to your students. The story is about a
scientifically accurate peek at the world from the pill bug’s point of view.
EXPLORE
Give each pair of students copies of the MySci™ Journal page and a hand lens. Have the
groups investigate their mystery guests and record their observations, including a drawing of
a pill bug. Ask the following questions: What do they look like? How big are they? What
shape are they? Which body parts can you find? Are they hard or soft?
Touching the animals is okay. Remind the students to respect the animals.
EXPLAIN
Write the definition of HABITAT up on the board. A habitat is a place where animals live and
are able to find their five basic needs. Point to the Missouri Department of Conservation
posters and explain that each of these posters represents a different habitat found in Missouri.
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What Is an Animal?
Lesson 2: What Do Animals Need and Where Do They Live?
Show the students that the pill bug can be found in the forest poster on the log at the bottom
right corner. This is where they live and find their basic needs.
Explain that this animal has many names, some of which include pill bug, sow bug, roly-poly,
woodlice, ball bug, potato bug, chuggy pig, and cheese-log. Ask the students some things they
learned about the pill bug.
Pill bugs are animals called isopods. They are often mistaken for insects because of their many
legs, hard outer skeleton, and two antennae. They are, however, a crustacean, which means
they are related to animals like shrimp, crabs, and lobsters.
NOTE TO TEACHER: Be certain to spray pill bugs with water daily. They will
need damp soil and decaying organic material (i.e. leaves, wood, etc.) to keep
them healthy. Pill bugs eat apples, pieces of potatoes, and leaf litter.
Pill bugs can be released into the schoolyard once the observations are
complete.
ELABORATE
Write the following question up on the board: What does a pill bug need in its habitat? Reread the story of the pill bug and ask your students to listen for its basic needs. When the
story is finished, ask for answers from your students and write them under the question on the
board.
After you have received answers from your students, explain to them that the whole class will
be responsible for building a pill bug habitat. This can be done as a demonstration with verbal
help from the students or small group assistance.
Divide students into groups. Have the students go outside to collect two or three items they
think a pill bug will need to survive in their habitat. Upon returning to the classroom, take all
materials collected and place them on a table. Have students decide which items are best for
building the habitat.
EVALUATE
Give each student a copy of the MySci™ Journal page and have them draw a picture of a pill
bug habitat out in the wild. Remind them that a habitat should include the five basic needs of
any animal (food, water, shelter, oxygen, and space).
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What Is an Animal?
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MySci™ Journal Drawing Page
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MySci™ Journal Graph Page
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MySci™ Journal Drawing and Writing Page
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MySci™ Journal Writing Page
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