5th+Grade+Science

This is a great place for you to find/upload great activities, exercises, worksheets you create, and useful webpages!
As always, remember to credit any sources if you upload a worksheet or activity. Please do this right beneath your link.

= **General Files for 5th grade science:** = Curriculum:

FOSS Kit overview (check out investigations 1-2 - you will need to incorporate parts of this)

When editing this page, please use the following format (meaning, please copy and paste to format shown below and fill in the relevant information:

*PLEASE COPY AND PASTE THE TEMPLATE, BUT LEAVE THE ONE BELOW BLANK SO IT CAN SERVE AS AN EXAMPLE*

***PLEASE: Only paste subject-specific games/activtities, etc. here. If the activity can be generalized, please enter it on the "Games and Activities!" page.***

=** ---HERE IS A SAMPLE TEMPLATE WITH SOME RECOMMENDATIONS!--- **= TITLE: Give it a catchy, fun title **- and use a color!**

TOPIC INVOLVED:

IS THIS A GAME, ACTIVITY, DOCUMENT, WEBSITE, VIDEO, ETC:

MATERIALS:
 * Be sure to list any vital materials (or possible substitutes)

BRIEF DESCRIPTION:
 * Describe the activity in steps.
 * Make sure you are describing the activity, game, etc. so that it is reproducable **(which is the scientific way after all!).**
 * give an approximate time for the activity

ANY SPECIFIC RECOMMENDATIONS?:
 * mention anything you recommend based on your personal experience!

SOURCE:
 * Credit yourself for listing it! Write your name in this form: "First Last (site year)" **=> e.g. Joe Smith (Ransom 2003)**
 * Also, credit the website or source from which the idea came!

If there is a relevant document, please upload it here (meaning, please "paste" the document below this line): Upload document, picture, etc. right here if you have one!

= Here are some useful activities, games, etc. that you might find helpful: =


 * TITLE: ** Owl Pellet Dissection!


 * TOPIC INVOLVED: ** Food Chain/Web, Introduction to the skeletal system


 * IS THIS A GAME, ACTIVITY, DOCUMENT, WEBSITE, VIDEO, ETC: ** Activity/Dissection


 * BRIEF DESCRIPTION: **
 * Here are some webpages that describe owl pellets and a sample activity
 * []
 * []
 * This is a diagram of an owl's digestive system, though you may want to simplify the picture and draw it yourself
 * []
 * The students will have a blast!
 * This is basically what a pellet looks like:


 * ANY SPECIFIC RECOMMENDATIONS?: **
 * Pair up the students, 2 per owl pellet
 * soak the owl pellets the morning of the activity
 * the activity should take 2 days, but it could run to 3 days if you want to have them put together their skeletons with glue (not always easy/successful).
 * have the students complete the dissection on newspaper or a few layers of paper towels.
 * Here is a good video to show the students. It shows an owl regurgitating an owl pellet!
 * @http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=waLiTmLr1nM (make sure you turn off the volume)
 * You could have the students put the bones in the FOSS kit "petri dishes" and use a sharpie to write their names on the lids to keep things organized. Each group will need two petri dishes--one for the owl pellet remains, and one for the uncovered bones.
 * Have the bone charts copied and available for the students. After the activity you could even get a class total to try to determine what their diet seems to consist of the most.
 * the owl pellets are sanitized, so students can feel free to get down and dirty with them with their hands! Obviously have them be careful and wash their hands thoroughly afterwards.
 * make sure to give good background, remind the students about food chains/webs, etc. I recommend drawing a sketch of the owl's digestive system on the board, showing the gizzard and how the pellet makes its way back up. Discuss what a pellet is and why owls do this, etc.
 * We had our students attempt to reassemble their rodent skeletons on construction paper with liquid glue as a way to transition from the ecosystems unit to the human bodies unit. Some of the groups were able to replicate the diagrams we gave them really well, but others were a little frustrated by working with such small parts.


 * SOURCE: **
 * The idea came from Emily Zuehlke (Carrollton 2010) and Kelli Fraga (Carrollton 2010)
 * __**the pellets can be ordered from Carolina Science**__. The "Owl Pellet Study Classroom Kit" is the way to go, getting an "Individual Study Kit" also if the classroom kit doesn't have enough (the individual kit comes with 3 pellets, itself).
 * []

If there is a relevant document, please upload it here (meaning, please "paste" the document below this line): None.


 * TITLE: ** Owl Adaptations


 * TOPIC INVOLVED: ** animal adaptations


 * IS THIS A GAME, ACTIVITY, DOCUMENT, WEBSITE, VIDEO, ETC: ** activity/ document


 * BRIEF DESCRIPTION: **
 * This document describes various owl adaptations
 * After reading the adaptations the students are asked to examine the physical vs. behavioral changes, they are also asked to pick one and describe what would happen to the owl if it did not have that one adaptation


 * ANY SPECIFIC RECOMMENDATIONS?: This activity goes along well with the owl pellet dissection **


 * SOURCE: **
 * The idea was from : http://www.eagle-bluff.org/Owl%20Pellets.pdf
 * ***some modifications done by: Ana Vargas (Ransom 2010)**

If there is a relevant document, please upload it here (meaning, please "paste" the document below this line):

TITLE: Biome Boxes

TOPIC INVOLVED: Ecosystems (8 biomes of the world, Producers/decomposers/consumers, food chains/webs)

IS THIS A GAME, ACTIVITY, DOCUMENT, WEBSITE, VIDEO, ETC: Project

BRIEF DESCRIPTION: I had each student choose one of the major biomes of the world on which to become an expert. I assigned the project on a Thursday and told the students to 1. find a box no smaller than a shoe box and no larger than a microwave, 2. research their project, and 3. decorate their box with the landscape of their biome (eg. sand, hills, snow, fake water, etc.) for Monday. On Monday, we learned about producers and photosynthesis, and the students added five producers found in their biome to their Biome Box for homework. We repeated this structure on Tuesday and Wednesday with consumers and decomposers+abiotics so that by Thursday, the students had a complete Biome Box that they presented to the class.

ANY SPECIFIC RECOMMENDATIONS?:
 * Give the students VERY specific instructions for what you are expecting when you first assign the project.
 * The students will probably have limited access to supplies and the internet, so having a supply of boxes, craft supplies, and books/printed articles about the biomes are a big help.
 * 1 week is the perfect amount of time for this project.
 * Have students practice presenting their Biome Boxes to their families the night before and have someone from home sign that they have watched the presentation.
 * For presentation day, assign each student one of the topics (ex. five producers.) As each student presents their project, the rest of the class should be listening especially for their topic to write down. That way, they can ask questions about any missing parts and can make a big class Graphic Organizer at the end to compare each of the producers/consumers/decomposers/abiotic objects in each biome.

SOURCE:
 * Emily Zuehlke (Carrollton 2010)

**If there is a relevant document, please upload it here (meaning, please "paste" the document below this line):**




 * TITLE: ** Parts of an Ecosystem


 * TOPIC INVOLVED: ** Producers and Decomposers; 8 characteristics of life


 * IS THIS A GAME, ACTIVITY, DOCUMENT, WEBSITE, VIDEO, ETC: ** experiment


 * BRIEF DESCRIPTION: ** To help the girls understand the characteristics of life, we had them plant two seeds each. The students crumpled up a sheet of newspaper so that it fit inside a clear plastic cup and they dampened the paper. Then, they slid a seed between the newspaper and the cup and stuck the cup in a window that got a lot of sunlight. We also put one of the cups of seeds in a dark cabinet away from sunlight, one seed in a zip lock bag in the window, and one seed in a zip lock bag with water in the window. Over the next six weeks, we charted the growth of our seeds in the science notebooks and propped up the plants on rulers as they got bigger.

We also had the girls find a piece of white bread at home and dab the piece of bread in moist (not wet) or dark corner in their house. Then, they put the bread slice in a sealed plastic bag in a dark cabinet and left it alone for approximately two weeks. When we removed the bags with the bread in them, the bread was fuzzy with decomposers--mold of all different colors. The students went crazy and decided that they needed to clean their houses better. We decided to let the decomposers grow for six weeks before throwing them out--not a science project to send home!


 * ANY SPECIFIC RECOMMENDATIONS?: **
 * water the seeds once a day--the newspaper dries out quickly.
 * bean and pea seeds work well.
 * this was a great project for our science notebooks.
 * the kids got super excited every day when they came in and saw how big their seeds had grown.
 * SOURCE: **
 * Emily Zuehlke (Carrollton 2010) and Kelli Fraga (Carrollton 2010)

If there is a relevant document, please upload it here (meaning, please "paste" the document below this line):

TITLE: Ecosystems Scavenger Hunt

TOPIC INVOLVED: Review of relationships in and parts of an ecosystem; Florida's biome

IS THIS A GAME, ACTIVITY, DOCUMENT, WEBSITE, VIDEO, ETC: activity/game

BRIEF DESCRIPTION: I gave groups of students cards with hints like an herbivore with wings, a food chain in action, an endangered species, a symbiotic relationship, a sign of a consumer, etc. We then walked around Carrollton's campus together. When the girls saw something that fit one of their clues, they drew it in their science notebooks. This activity could be done as a competition to determine who finds the most or draws the most accurate observation, but we just did it as a review.

ANY SPECIFIC RECOMMENDATIONS?:
 * Could be done as homework
 * This was an awesome experience for the kids. Few of them have spent any time observing the environment around them, so they loved seeing simple things like cool flowers, dragonflies, and crabs. They talked about this class more than any other activity we did in the ecosystems unit.

SOURCE:
 * Emily Zuehlke (Carrollton 2010)

**If there is a relevant document, please upload it here (meaning, please "paste" the document below this line):**


 * TITLE: ** Create your own Limiting Factor Quiz

Ecosystems and limiting factors. limiting factors article. Have the students do jump in reading when reading each of the three sections. After they finish reading the a section you stop and have them raise their hand to put at least 2 notes for each paragraph in that section on the board on the board. They are basically learning how to take good notes by taking the most important things out of each paragraph in the section. Then once done reading the article the students have to come up with their own 5 question 3 answer multiple choice quiz based on the article and then they switch with their classmates. []
 * TOPIC INVOLVED: **
 * IS THIS A GAME, ACTIVITY, DOCUMENT, WEBSITE, VIDEO, ETC: Activity/Document **
 * MATERIALS: **
 * BRIEF DESCRIPTION: **
 * ANY SPECIFIC RECOMMENDATIONS?: **
 * Have them grade it.
 * Have each section name on the board and space so they can put the notes in the section.
 * SOURCE: **
 * If there is a relevant document, please upload it here (meaning, please "paste" the document below this line):**


 * TITLE: Exploring Pond Water **


 * TOPIC INVOLVED: Microscopes, protozoans, unicellular organisms (teresa, Ransom 2011) **


 * IS THIS A GAME, ACTIVITY, DOCUMENT, WEBSITE, VIDEO, ETC: LAB **
 * MATERIALS: **
 * ** microscopes **
 * ** glass slides **
 * ** slide cover slips **
 * ** pond water (see recommendations on how to collect) **
 * ** eye dropper **
 * ** science notebooks **


 * BRIEF DESCRIPTION: **
 * Prepare pond water slides: use eye dropper to put one drop of pond water on a slide, then cover drop with cover slip. Give slides to students and have them examine them on high power to get a feel for what's in pond water. They can record their drawings and observatiosn in their science notebooks. **


 * ANY SPECIFIC RECOMMENDATIONS?: **
 * When collecting the pond water or sea water, you'll want to get as many little microorganisms / protozoans as possible. The best way to do this is to find a dirty pond or canal, gather water into a water bottle and add a few strands of seaweed. Protozoans tend to hang out on seaweed, but after a few hours, they'll drop to be bottom of the water bottle, where you can collect them with the eye dropper. **
 * SOURCE: **
 * I kind of just made this up. **


 * If there is a relevant document, please upload it here (meaning, please "paste" the document below this line):**


 * TITLE: Growing Germs **


 * TOPIC INVOLVED: Spontaneous generation, Observation, Qualitative & Quantitative Data **


 * IS THIS A GAME, ACTIVITY, DOCUMENT, WEBSITE, VIDEO, ETC: **


 * MATERIALS: **
 * Bread (Preferably White) **
 * Sandwich Bags ( Zip lock) **
 * Water* ( After two weeks, if you don't see any mold, apply some water to the bread) **


 * BRIEF DESCRIPTION: **
 * Each students will receive one piece of bread and one zip lock bag. Then they'll cough, sneeze and rub their desk to gather germs on their hands, after that they'll rub the bread gently with their "Germy" Hands. Before they place the bread in the bag, allow them to label their zip lock bag (Name & Period) . Once the bread is in the bag, collect it and find a dark place to put them in (Empty Draw) & ever Monday and Friday allow the students to observe the bread, they should write down any quantitative and quantitative aspects they observe. **
 * * After two weeks, if you don't see and mold its time to help the bread out. If you can find an old spray bottle, add water to it and spray each student piece of bread. **
 * ANY SPECIFIC RECOMMENDATIONS?: **
 * Just watch the students when their gently rubbing the bread and when their coughing, because things can get out of control; just stay on them. **
 * SOURCE: **
 * Corey Wheeler (Ransom 2012) **
 * Paul Natland **
 * If there is a relevant document, please upload it here (meaning, please "paste" the document below this line):**

Observation(Qualitative & Quantitative) Activity/Experiment
 * TITLE: **
 * Classroom Garden **
 * TOPIC INVOLVED: **
 * IS THIS A GAME, ACTIVITY, DOCUMENT, WEBSITE, VIDEO, ETC: **
 * MATERIALS: **
 * small plant cups
 * soil
 * three different packs of plant seeds

Each student will be able to choose from 3 different plant seeds to plant on there own. Each student will have a number that will be written on their plant cup in order to know its their's. Students will make a chart in their science notebook for observations( qualitative & quantitative) and drawings. Every Monday and Friday they will observe their plants and write their observations in their chart for that day. Also ask the students if the plants need to be watered don't water it for them. Make sure you set the plants in a place where they can receive sunlight. Brandon Williams (Ransom 2012) Paul Natland
 * BRIEF DESCRIPTION: **
 * ANY SPECIFIC RECOMMENDATIONS?: **
 * SOURCE: **
 * If there is a relevant document, please upload it here (meaning, please "paste" the document below this line):**


 * TITLE: **


 * TOPIC INVOLVED: **


 * IS THIS A GAME, ACTIVITY, DOCUMENT, WEBSITE, VIDEO, ETC: **
 * MATERIALS: **


 * BRIEF DESCRIPTION: **


 * ANY SPECIFIC RECOMMENDATIONS?: **


 * SOURCE: **


 * If there is a relevant document, please upload it here (meaning, please "paste" the document below this line):**


 * TITLE: **


 * TOPIC INVOLVED: **


 * IS THIS A GAME, ACTIVITY, DOCUMENT, WEBSITE, VIDEO, ETC: **
 * MATERIALS: **


 * BRIEF DESCRIPTION: **


 * ANY SPECIFIC RECOMMENDATIONS?: **


 * SOURCE: **


 * If there is a relevant document, please upload it here (meaning, please "paste" the document below this line):**


 * TITLE: **


 * TOPIC INVOLVED: **


 * IS THIS A GAME, ACTIVITY, DOCUMENT, WEBSITE, VIDEO, ETC: **
 * MATERIALS: **


 * BRIEF DESCRIPTION: **


 * ANY SPECIFIC RECOMMENDATIONS?: **


 * SOURCE: **


 * If there is a relevant document, please upload it here (meaning, please "paste" the document below this line):**