THINKING SCIENCE
Notesheet Lesson 7
Classification
Names ……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………
More classifying
Activity 1 Count the animals
Remember that the living world is divided into plants and animals.
There are several animals in the picture on the Workcard.
Can you spot them all?
How many are there?
The animals can be divided into smaller and smaller groups.
One way could be like this diagram.
How many are in each group?
Animals
Write the number of animals in each group
in the box.
Birds
Other animals
Discuss these questions and jot down your
group’s answers.
1
How many birds are there?
Ducks
Other birds
2 Are there more birds or more animals?
3 How many animals are not birds?
White ducks
Dark ducks
4 How many animals are not ducks?
5 How many animals are not dark ducks?
6 Are there more animals that are not birds or more animals that are
not ducks?
(Hint: what would be left if all the ducks flew away?
What would be left if all the birds flew away?)
© P. Adey, M. Shayer, C. Yates 2001. Thinking Science
67
Notesheet 2 • Lesson 7
THINKING SCIENCE
Names ……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………
Activity 2 Characteristics of birds
Four hundred and fifty different types of birds have been officially
recorded in Britain. About 200 of these are quite common. To make it
easier to study so many types, they must be sorted into groups.
What do we call this sorting process?
What do we call someone who studies birds?
See if your group can help ornithologists by making a classification
system. Look at the 20 pictures of birds you have been given.
List four characteristics your group might use for sorting the birds.
A:
B:
C:
D:
Now think about ‘size’ as a characteristic for classifying birds (your
group may have already chosen this).
Use the size of the birds to sort them into three groups.
Small birds
Medium birds
Large birds
How many birds has your group got in each pile? Is it the same as other
groups?
How did your group decide which were small birds and which were large?
Was it an easy decision to make?
Designing a useful system
Is it useful to use ‘size’ as a way of classifying birds?
Look again at all the characteristics of the birds you have been given.
Which does your group think are the most useful for classifying? (You can
give more than one.)
Use these characteristics to regroup your birds into a more useful
classification. Produce a list of the birds in each group, and the
characteristics for each of those groups of birds.
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© P. Adey, M. Shayer, C. Yates 2001. Thinking Science
Notesheet 3 • Lesson 7
THINKING SCIENCE
Names ……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………
An odd bird
When your group has finished designing your classification system, ask
your teacher for a picture of a humming bird.
Discuss these questions:
Does this fit into any of the groups you have made?
If it does, which group and why? If it does not, why doesn’t it?
Would you make a new bird classification system now you have been given the
humming bird to add? If you did make a new system, how would you do this?
Classifying at home
In the last two lessons you have done lots of ‘sorting out’ of different
things.
Write down two sorts of things that you or people you know find it
useful to classify at home or at work (not any of the things you classify
in science lessons).
Try to design a classification system for one of these things.
© P. Adey, M. Shayer, C. Yates 2001. Thinking
Science
69