Eco-ED Module Title: Biodiversity Workshop
Module
Leader(s):
(name)
Short
Description:
(Include brochure information on pages following this chart.)
EcoEd
Concept(s):
(list)
EcoEd Literacy
Goal(s):
(list)
Benjamin Morse
Students will be introduced to the subject of biodiversity and its importance to the ecosystem. They will conclude the workshop by making masks of different species and putting on a small skit to demonstrate the importance of biodiversity in nature.
Endangered species
Kathryn Harmon
Biodiversity significance
Show how a varied population of animals increases the strength, beauty, and sustainability of an ecosystem.
Understanding the necessity of genetic diversity and niche diversity
Place importance on animals and other nontraditional life forms in the ecosystem such as plants, fungi and microbes
Understand the complex nature of an ecosystem and the necessity of balance within.
Recognizing their own role within an ecosystem and their responsibility to maintain it.
1-4 Intended
Grade(s):
(circle)
Module
Objectives:
(list)
Materials needed:
(list)
Timeline:
At the end of this students will be able to: create a complex network of dependence in an ecosystem
Recognize the value of producers, consumers, herbivores, carnivores, decomposers
(fungi, microbes, insects) and habitats
Conceptualize the dangers if a certain group is diminished
Understand extinction and its causes including human effects
Craft supplies: (ex) construction Materials vary based on skillset of students paper, glue, string, hole punches, scissors, crayons, markers
0-5 minutes present
Introductions/what is biodiversity
5-10 minutes
10-15 minutes
15-25 minutes
25-50 minutes
50-55 minutes
First brain pop junior video on food chains do yarn food web exercise
Second brain pop video show diagram and discuss
Activity – Mask Making/additional background information provided
Wrap up/cleanup/regroup
55-60 minutes
60-65 minutes
Know your role and share it to others
Biodiversity skit
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Activity
Description:
(Provide enough detail so that someone else could run the workshop.
Include worksheets on pages following this chart.)
65-70 minutes Ending Remarks and Questions (using last slide of PowerPoint)
Through watching brain pop videos, short quizzes and activities, open discussion, and slide presentation, the idea of what biodiversity is will be introduced. Students will be inspired to choose an organism that they find important in biodiversity to make a mask.
While students are making the mask additional information will be provided about endangered species local to New York, displayed in slideshow format with awe inspiring pictures. This will help them understand the beauty of biodiversity and the complex relations between food webs and niches. After their masks are complete the importance of biodiversity will be further developed by subsequent brain pop video/s. After further discussion about why biodiversity is important teachers will aid students to write on the inside of their masks the importance of their organism for biodiversity richness, their role in the ecosystem, and if they are endangered or at threatened to be. Once this is done it is optional depending on the student body if they want to share what they wrote about their organism. If not the teacher can read out some examples. The event culminates in
2 short ~1 minute skits. The first will show the normal cyclic nature of an ecosystem and how it functions in a healthy manner. The second skit will demonstrate what happens when ecosystems suffer from a lack of biodiversity. The event will conclude with answering any questions and surmising the important highlights in a few short sentences that the students should be able to take away.
The majority of this exercise will be aided by a PowerPoint
Part 1- Introductions and opening questions
 The instructors will introduce themselves.
 The instructor will ask students what they currently know about biodiversity, food webs, energy pyramids, or ecosystems
Part 2- Formally introduce Biodiversity
 Discuss what different roles or (niches) are o Plants- producers take in all the energy from the sun used by the ecosystem o Consumers eat producers o Herbivores- primary consumers that eat producers o Carnivores- secondary consumers that eat other consumers o Decomposers such as certain bugs, fungi, and bacteria bread down dead animals and plants returning the nutrients to the soil to be absorbed by plants completing the cycle of life.
Part 3- Video 1
 Students will watch the following brain pop video further explaining biodiversity in terms of food web and energy pyramid.
 http://www.brainpop.com/science/ecologyandbehavior/foodchains/
 Junior version: http://www.brainpopjr.com/science/animals/foodchain/
 http://www.brainpop.com/science/ourfragileenvironment/extinction/
Part 4-play the yarn game

Students are to hold onto a piece of yarn as it is linked at random to the students in a
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Parent/Guardi an Follow Up: circle
 The students then see what happens when one person tugs on the string and what happens when one or two of the lines are cut
Part 5-Video 2
 Junior version: http://www.brainpopjr.com/science/conservation/extinctandendangeredspecies/ preview.weml
 The students will be probed with basic questions about what they saw in the short clips to reinforce what they learned.
 They will be show to similar habitats one pristine the other destroyed
Part 6- mask design and background PowerPoint.
 Students will now be provided with the choice of masks to create that they feel are important for biodiversity.
 They will be provided with arts and crafts supplies to make their paper masks
 During their designing of the mask additional information about why biodiversity is important will be displayed through verbal discussion of points with a slide show of awe inspiring pictures
Reasons for biodiversity importance

Provides resistance to changing environmental conditions and varying weather

Redundancies allows for dynamic stabilizing changes that also slows down rates of environmental change to speeds adaptable by evolution

Restores nutrients in a cyclic manner
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Population control
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Invasive species
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Pollination sequestration and removal (at limited quantities)
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Human benefits: o natural resources: water, wood, fuel, food, valuable materials i.e. ores, scientific discoveries for uses such as health, materials, other innovations o beauty and recreation
Part 7-
 Each student will explain why they chose their organism and why their organisms is important for ecosystem stability and biodiversity (state
 Students should write down the importance on the inside of their masks along with the dangers if their organism is removed from the ecosystem.
 Students will also state why their organism to be in endangered if applicable
Part 8-Skit
 If time permits student s with the help of the teacher can have short 1-2 minute skits showing how an ecosystem behaves with a health bio-diverse community versus a homogenous one.
Dear Parent/ Guardian,
Your student recently participated in an environmental education program about the biodiversity. Ask your child what they learned about…
- why we need biodiversity
- life cycle
- what happens if all the _(type of animal or plant)_ die?
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At the end of this exercise students will be able to:
 Explain the major roles plants and animals take in the ecosystem such as producers consumers and decomposers
 Identify biodiversity from monocultures
 Understand that biodiversity strengthens ecosystems and produces natural resources
 Understand that Humans are connected to ecosystems and that we are part of one
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