Some resources from federal government sites are currently unavailable; when possible, we’ve provided alternative non-government links to ensure continued data access.
Provided by: Illinois Department of Natural Resources |Published on: June 13, 2025
Lesson Plans
678
Synopsis
This lesson plan from the Illinois Department of Natural Resources provides two possible activities for students to explore biodiversity in an Illinois location that is familiar to them.
Hands-on exploration is encouraged in this lesson, which allows students to build important skills like collecting data, making observations, discussing their observations, and questioning their findings.
This lesson plan is ready to go with very little prep required from the teacher.
Collaboration and field research are integrated into this lesson, allowing students to explore biodiversity in natural habitats in their location in Illinois while working with others.
Prerequisites
Teachers should introduce the terms ecoregion, gall, ground-truthing, migration, native species, noxious, precipitation, rapid assessment, and sampling.
Print out copies for each student of the Ecoregional Survey, as well as an additional set of copies for each group to use in the follow-up section.
If you plan to do Part II of this lesson, print out copies of the BioBlitz Survey for each student.
The teacher needs to gather field guides ahead of time. There are suggestions for resources for the field guides in the Resources section on page 36. In addition, local nature centers and the Internet can be used.
If you plan to complete Part II of this lesson, you will need to have access to a natural outdoor area for the students to conduct their research that is safe and accessible to the entire class.
Small magnifying glasses can be helpful if conducting Part II.
Students should be familiar with biodiversity and how biodiversity loss contributes to climate change.
Differentiation & Implementation
Students may need support using field guides and finding information on the internet. Making a list of websites they should visit to answer their questions and providing field guides is recommended.
Students can connect this lesson to climate change by looking at the depletion of resources and development in the areas they collected data on and discussing how those changes can cause a loss of biodiversity.
This video on why biodiversity is so important is an excellent way to introduce or refresh students' understanding of the relationship between biodiversity and climate change.
There are many options for assessing understanding of this lesson and standards available in the lesson plan on pages 34 and 35. Students can choose from the options to present their findings and understanding in a way that is relevant and interesting to them.
An extension to this lesson can be having the class participate in this project where students help collect local data to establish baseline numbers about biodiversity in their areas.
Part II of this lesson can provide opportunities for collecting scientific data that can then be graphed to help practice graphing and data analysis skills.
A possible extension idea is given on page 35 to allow students to revisit the area where they collected their data during different seasons and possibly even different years.
Scientist Notes
Teaching Tips
Standards
Resource Type and Format
Related Teaching Resources
All resources can be used for your educational purposes with proper attribution to the content provider.
