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Local Safari

Keith Edkins [CC BY-SA 2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)], via Wikimedia CommonsThis activity will help students understand some of the obvious and lesser-known creatures which live in their local area, and gain insight as to how these animals provide food for one another.

Students will explore their local area, documenting the animals they find along the way. This activity could encompass a simple forage around the immediate area of your school grounds, or could be expanded to a half-day visit to the beach, forest or park. Don’t be put off if you’re city-based – you’ll find just as much biodiversity, often more, if you look hard enough! If you have completed our Local Environment Mapping Activity then consider carrying out your safari in the same area, so that you can use the results to create another layer for your map.

Students will gain an appreciation of what’s already under their noses but which they may not have noticed. A lot of fauna hides in plain sight, but is only noticeable if you take time to look for it.

Students will also build a food web or food chain representing some of the animals living in their local area, showing how each depends on the others. This should foster an understanding of the importance of all animals in an ecosystem.

 

Download the Local Safari activity »

 

Image by Keith Edkins [CC BY-SA 2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

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