Grade Level: Grades 6 - 8

Content Areas: Math

Science

Social Studies

Language Arts

Basic Concepts: Migration

Journalizing

Vocabulary

Creative Writing

Spelling

Geography

Public Speaking

Research Skills

Plant Reproduction

Ecosystems

1. Learn about the length it takes for a ecosystem to return to what it was before a volcanic eruption.

2. Students will get an understanding for how plant and animal life are able to get into a system that they lived in before. Also, they will see what changes will occur in the system when the animal or plant comes into the system.

3. Students will discover that the live plant and animal life that existed before an eruption is vastly different from the one that will take place now.

Materials: Swiss Family Robinson video Jell-O

Simpsons cartoon- Visit to Australia Journals

Computers with Internet access Water

Notebooks Magazines

Tea Kettle Encyclopedias

Pen or pencil

30 aluminum tins

Construction paper

Shoe box

Markers

Glue

1. Students will get a basic understanding of what different ecosystems have been effected by volcanic eruptions in the past 5 years.

2. Students will understand the time it takes for places to recover from volcanic eruptions

Time Frame: 45 Minutes

Materials: Computers

Paper

Pen

1. Students will count off in to pairs so that they are working with a different classmate than they usually do.

2. The team will then go onto a computer and research on the web to find a recently erupted volcano. (Excluding the ones in the Ring of Fire)

3. One of the students will come up to you and tell you the volcano they will use. The volcanoes will be on a first come, first serve basis, so the first group to come to you with a certain volcano will get it.

4. The team will then research the volcano to see the damage that was done. Things to look for include total loss of land/forests consumed, death toll, animal life lost, and the problems caused.

5. The teams will come back to the room and report on the variety of information that they have found.

6. The teacher will keep a running total of math facts, i.e. the land covered in lava, the death toll, and how fast the lava traveled.

7. The students will take the math information and add it all up. They will figure out averages for the volcanoes that have been reported on as well.

8. Students will turn in the answers along with a sentence telling how much work their partner did on the project.

EXTENSION: The students can go to encyclopedias to research past eruptions from the same volcano or same vicinity. This short project could actually be made to span longer if you made it a research project.

ASSESSMENT: Students will be graded using the rubrics for Class Presentations and Class Participation. Success will be only one two overall.

1. Students will get a better understanding into what the each ecosystem needs to function.

2. Students will see how animals were able to make it from one place to another.

Time Frame: 1 Hour

Materials: Simpsons Video

Swiss Family Robinson Video

Notebook

Pen or pencil

1. The class will start out with a part from the Simpsons video. In this video, Bart brings a frog to Australia. The frog then goes on to change the ecosystem around them.

2. The class will the discuss what types of things have been brought to America and reshaped both our Ecosystem, and how we have lived.

Examples include:

AIDS

Bees

Sea Lamprey

3. The students will then watch part of the video "The Swiss Family Robinson." In this video, the family introduces new animals to a ecosystem.

4. Using these two movies, the students will fill out the worksheet on the introduction to new plants and animals.

EXTENSION: The lesson can be lengthened by having the students watch all of Swiss Family Robinson, and read the book as well. They then could compare how each of the ecosystems changed differently even thought the two are the same story.

ASSESSMENT: Students will be assessed by using the rubrics for Participation and Worksheet. Success will be nothing less then a three overall.

1. Students will understand that everything that is in the United States was not here when we got here.

2. Students will work on research skills to understand what types of non-material things were brought to the United States as well.

Time Frame: 1 Hour

Materials: What the students bring in.

1. The teacher will start out by showing a map of America. From there, the teacher will move Westward around the earth.

2. As we go from country to country, any student that has a object from that country will go in front of the class and explain the object. Things to be included are: name of the object, where it came from, estimated time it was introduced to the United States, and impact that it has had on this country.

3. The students will use all of these objects as the basis for a discussion on the starting of a new island.

4. The students will now talk about how other, non-material things were brought into the country. (i.e. cultures, traits, names, styles) The things may have been brought in with the pilgrims or brought in last year.

5. Try to get the students involved by having each of them talk about the family background and the traits that they brought to the classroom.

1. You can have students each talk about their heritage in a speech and explain the aspects of their race that have been intertwined in America.

2. Students could also start a class island in which they each put something from their own culture into it to make it a self functioning entity.

Assessment: Students will be graded using the rubrics for Class Presentations and for Participation.

1. Student will develop their own ecosystem based on the information that they learned today.

2. Students will see how important it is to set-up a town in which is near by everything that is essential to survive.

3. Students will rationalize what the most important things needed to start an island.

Time Frame: 3 hours

Materials: Shoe Box

Paint

Construction Paper

Pen or Pencil

Paper

Any other art supplies you have.

1. The students will each get one shoe box to begin the project with.

2. The students will then receive the list of instructions as to what should be in their diorama. (See separate sheet)

3. Using anything they can find, the students have to build a functioning ecosystem.

4. Each student will write out what things and people they brought with them and why.

5. Each person will show their ecosystem in front of the class, rationalizing why it would work.

EXTENSION: This assignment could be altered to fit over many days. The students could have to build everything exactly how they wanted it and how it would look. The students could also write a story about how the ship landed there and how well the new ctiy did. (i.e.. Swiss Family Robinson)

ASSESSMENT: Students will be graded based on Diorama, the Presentation rubric and Ecosystem rubric. Success will be based on no more then one 2.

1. Students will get a first hand look at how destructive volcanoes are.

2. The students will see how long it takes for lava to travel across an island.

Time Frame: 30 Minutes

Materials: Lava Facts page

Jell-O

Tea kettle

Thirty aluminum pie tins

Newspaper

Journal

Pen

Water

1. Using the Lava Facts page, the students will learn how lava travels and how at what speed it does.

2. The students will try out the flow of lava by pouring have chilled jell-o on their dioramas.

3. Each student will report back to the teacher on how long it took for the lava to flow onto the diorama.

4. Students will figure out the average time it took to destroy their own ecosystem.

5. The students will write in their journals on what is was like to see their own island destroyed. The students will also answer the question "What would be the hardest material thing to see destroyed by a volcano?"

1. In the Jell-O, you can mix a variety of different solids to represent the that come out of the volcano.

2. The teacher may also want to use flour to show how ash covers the land as well.

ASSESSMENT: Students will be graded using the participation rubric. Success will be nothing less than a two on anything.

Resources for this Lesson

Encyclopedia America Danbury, Con: Grolier Inc., 1995.

Goulka, James E. and Sufra, Jacob E. The New Encyclopedia Brittanica. Chicago: Encyclopedia Brittanica Inc., 1997.

The World Book Encyclopedia. Chicago: World Book Inc., 1992.