Hitchcock Center for the Environment | Education for a Healthy Planet

Amazing Animal Adaptations Virtual Field Trip

Grades 1-4

How do animals survive in the wild? In this virtual field trip we focus on the amazing diversity of life on the planet and in our area. In our pre-trip video, students will be introduced to live teaching animals by tuning into the talk show “Good Morning Animals”. Viewers will learn about how biology and behavior helps animals survive in habitats in unique ways. We will also come together as a class in a live interactive stream to share our experiences with local animals adaptation in addition to observation of our teaching animals and stuffed mounts. Students will also explore the concept of biomimicry and human adaptations through conversation and games.

Field Trip Requirements

Prior to the live meeting, students should:

Watch the pre-field trip video.
Complete Adaptation Match Up sheet.

During the live meeting, we will:

Discuss the pre-trip video.
Observe a stuffed mount up close.
Explore concept of natural selection with the Peppered moth.
Meet and observe one of the Hitchcock Center teaching animals.
Participate in a Biomimicry Match Up game.

Further Resources

Further Resources which supplement the field trip topic. These are not required for the live meeting but are just additional virtual resources.

Explore

Take a walk around or block or in the woods with this Local Animal Scavenger Hunt. See if you can notice these animals and their behaviors.

WATCH

This video series shows scientists observing animal behavior and interaction from an animal’s point of view, with robotic spy animals. Below are my three favorites, but there are many more.

Live streams for animals observation

If you’d like to observe live animal behavior of an animal not from Massachusetts you can find many windows into those worlds at the sites below.

There are some live streams of animals in their natural habitat. There are also many animals in zoos or aquariums. These establishments work hard to recreate the animals habitat to encourage them to behave as if they were in the wild.