This video explains that all animals need habitats that provide access to food, water, shelter, and space.
Students will learn about niches and how all animals must have their own job in the habitat to survive.
Teaching Tips
Positives
This succinct video introduces habitats in an uncomplicated way.
The narrator explains many key vocabulary terms and uses beneficial visuals and labels to help with comprehension.
Additional Prerequisites
Though the term "niche" is explained in the video, teachers may want to go over the concept before students view the video.
Teachers may want to pause the video periodically to explain some of the narrator's methods, such as the animal business cards.
Differentiation
Students could take notes or draw pictures on a simple graphic organizer with the terms food, water, shelter, and space during or after the video.
Cross-curricular connections could be made to language arts lessons as students learn to summarize, determine the main idea, and ask and answer questions about word meanings.
Other resources on this topic include this video on the impact of climate change on habitats, this artwork that shows how human actions impact animals, and these games and activities that teach students about ecosystems and environmental justice.
Scientist Notes
This resource spotlights key qualities species must exhibit including how they can interact with each other to survive in their ecological niche. This is recommended for teaching.
Standards
Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS)
LS1: From Molecules to Organisms: Structures and Processes
K-LS1-1 Use observations to describe patterns of what plants and animals (including humans) need to survive.
LS4: Biological Evolution: Unity and Diversity
2-LS4-1 Make observations of plants and animals to compare the diversity of life in different habitats.
3-LS4-3 Construct an argument with evidence that in a particular habitat some organisms can survive well, some survive less well, and some cannot survive at all.
Common Core English Language Arts Standards (CCSS.ELA)
Reading: Informational Text (K-12)
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RI.2.4 Determine the meaning of words and phrases in a text relevant to a grade 2 topic or subject area.
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RI.3.2 Determine the main idea of a text; recount the key details and explain how they support the main idea.
Speaking & Listening (K-12)
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.SL.1.3 Ask and answer questions about what a speaker says in order to gather additional information or clarify something that is not understood.
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.SL.4.2 Paraphrase portions of a text read aloud or information presented in diverse media and formats, including visually, quantitatively, and orally.
