3rd Grade Life Science In-Class Programs
In-Class Programs for 3rd Grade Life Science
Life Cycles and Traits / Interdependent Relationships in Ecosystems
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| Provider Name | Resource Link | Provider Location | Abstract |
|---|---|---|---|
| CA Dept of Fish and Wildlife, Sacramento Region | Classroom Aquarium Education Project (CAEP) | Sacramento | The Classroom Aquarium Education Program (CAEP - also known as Trout-in the Classroom and Steelhead in the Classroom) is a community-based program which allows students to experience first hand the delicate balance needed for animals to survive in aquatic ecosystems. Using eggs provided by a hatchery, classes set-up and maintain an aquarium for the purpose of observing the development of fish from the eyed-egg stage until they become young fry. Students engage in course of study which supports the leaning experience across curriculum area. This program is run cooperatively by local schools, fishing clubs and government agencies. |
| CuriOdyssey | Wildlife Program: Catch Me if You Can | San Mateo | Have you ever played tag? How did you stay away from the person who was “it”? Did you hide or run very fast? In nature, animals have to be on the look out for predators – survival is the goal! Learn how animals keep themselves alive and how they defend themselves. |
| CuriOdyssey | Wildlife Program: Animal Connections | San Mateo | Meet animal ambassadors from CuriOdyssey and make special connections through a variety of learning methods. This program is designed to fit and support a variety of cognitive and developmental needs. Please contact the Programs Animal Keeper for more information on how we can construct this program to fit the needs of your group. |
| CuriOdyssey | Wildlife Program: Thrive and Survive | San Mateo | Did you know that people and animals need the same resources in order to live? What if one or more of those resources were gone? How could this affect animals? People? Students will learn how changes to the environment can affect animals. They will also discover how animals react to pesticides and what can happen if non-native animals take over resources. In this program, we will explore how people can help conserve resources such as food, water and space to help animals survive. What small changes can we make in our daily lives to help conserve and protect the natural resources we all share? |
| CuriOdyssey | Audible Adventure - In-Class | San Mateo | What is sound? How does the shape of ears help or hinder hearing? How can animals use sound clues to navigate their world? These questions form the foundation of our inquiry into the world of sound. Students make “laughing cups,” experiment with sound and explore using their sense of hearing. Let’s hear it for this audible adventure! Also available as a field trip program. |
| CuriOdyssey | Wildlife Program: Here, There, Habitats are Everywhere | San Mateo | Could you live in the desert, tundra or both? Did you know that most animals can live in one or two types of habitats? In this program, we will learn how animals are equipped for different environments such as the heat of the desert, shadows of the forest, underground and in your backyard. Students will make a connection between the type of habitat and the adaptations needed to live there. |
| CuriOdyssey | Wildlife Program: Animal Super Powers | San Mateo | What if you could breathe under water, run faster, blend into your surroundings or fly? How could these skills help you? There are many animals that have their very own “super power”…..they have adaptations. Students will learn what adaptations are and how animals can use them to survive. |
| CuriOdyssey | Wildlife Program: What's on the Menu? | San Mateo | Did you know that animals eat different things? Animals are able to eat certain foods based on where they live and what they look like (their body). Students will learn about tooth structure, habitats and adaptations of herbivores, omnivores, carnivores, decomposers and experience a live animal feeding. |
| CuriOdyssey | Fur, Feathers, Scales, or Exoskeletons - In-Class | San Mateo | Explore the basic coverings of mammals, birds, reptiles, and arthropods. Students can touch and talk about similarities, differences, and functions of each type of covering, plus see some wonderful live examples of animals that are covered in fur, feathers, scales, or exoskeletons. Live animals vary and may include: Rabbit, rat, bird, snake, blue-tongued skink, tarantula, cockroach, and millipede. 50 minutes. Also available as a field trip. |
| Diablo Valley Fly Fishermen | Trout in the Classroom | Trout in the Classroom, now know as the Classroom Aquarium Education Program (CAEP) in California (encompassing Trout in the Classroom, Steelhead in the Classroom, Salmonids in the Classroom, and the Salmon and Trout Education Program) is a relatively simple program and has been a huge success so far. Basically, teachers set up an aquarium and incubate trout eggs in their classroom, under the guidance of a Trout in the Classroom coordinator. Together, they ensure that all of the equipment has been purchased and is assembled by January. The teacher and students are responsible for daily maintenance and observation of the eggs, while the coordinator is responsible for obtaining permits and delivering the eggs. The final result is an aquarium full of trout fry that is released into a pre-approved body of water during a class field trip. Trout in the Classroom is an extremely rewarding program for everybody involved, whether student, teacher, or mentor. | |
| East Bay Regional Park District | Mobile Visitor Center | Oakland | Imagine a “closet on wheels,” filled with materials for teaching any range of nature-related topics. And it even comes with a professional nature educator! Groups of up to 30 students at a time engage in topics including: ~ Watersheds ~ Local Mammals ~ Reptiles and Amphibians |
| Greater Farallones Association | Crab Cab | San Francisco | What is a crab? How do crabs survive? Where do crabs live? The Crab Cab is a 45-minute At Your School program for K-3rd graders on crab diversity and natural history. The program includes hands-on activities and crab artifacts. |
| Happy Hollow Park & Zoo | Life Cycle Loop | San Jose | All animals emerge, grow, live, thrive and die in a never-ending revolution but not always in the same way. The variety of animal life cycles Variation can provide advantages Vocabulary: Precocial/Altricial/ 3 & 4-stage cycles |
| Happy Hollow Park & Zoo | Habitat Hunting with Trait Tools | San Jose | Location, location, location that matches the clothes. Animals choose homes that match their needs & abilities. [optional 2-part series] Matching adaptations to habitats Adaptation traits inherited [part 1] Adaptation traits chosen to enhance survival [part 2] Animals group for enhancing survival Vocabulary: Environment/Habitat/Traits/Resources/Detrimental |
| Junior Center of Art and Science | Animal Adventures | Oakland | Reptiles and/or invertebrates come to your classroom for a lesson centered on habitats, adaptations, fun facts and more. Meet snakes, geckos, tortoises, millipedes, cockroaches, hermit crabs and spiders! |
| Lindsay Wildlife Experience | Learning from Wildlife | Walnut Creek | Wildlife can teach us a lot about how to survive in the natural world. Let’s explore animal adaptations and how we can learn from them to meet our own human needs. |
| Lindsay Wildlife Experience | Have to Have a Habitat | Walnut Creek | How do adaptations help animals survive in certain habitats? This program investigates an animal’s physical adaptations to determine if they could survive in California’s diverse ecosystems. |
| Mad Science - Bay Area | Bugs | Concord | Learn the difference between a bug and an insect. How do insects defend themselves? What is their role in the ecosystem? What does the world look like to a bug? Answer these questions and more. |
| Mad Science - Bay Area | All About Animals | Concord | Feathers, fins, fur and more! Explore the animal kingdom and learn about the habitats, anatomy and life cycles of your favorite creatures. Make your own animal track, and explore the amazing, and sometimes strange, sounds that animals make. |
| Marine Science Institute | Inland Voyages-Marine Habitats | Redwood City | Each hands-on program examines different habitats by showcasing the unique adaptations of the marine animals that live in each. Students work with live marine animals and plants, marine artifacts, and identification keys. These habitats are those commonly found in the San Francisco Bay surrounding areas.The following is a description of the different Marine Habitat Inland Voyages that are currently offered: Rocky Intertidal Habitat - how tidepool animals move, eat and protect themselves. Sandy Beach - how Sandy Beach animals are adapted to survive above and below the sand. Marshes & Mudflats - fish and invertebrates commonly found in the local marshes and mudflats. Kelp Forests - the kelp forest food web and human uses of kelp. Open Ocean - the larger, pelagic animals that live away from the coastal waters of the Pacific Ocean. |
| Marine Science Institute | Inland Voyages-Bay and Ocean Invertebrates | Redwood City | How do so many creatures survive in rocky tidepools along the coast? What animals actually thrive in the muddy bottom of the Bay? How do the Bay invertebrates differ from their saltier cousins? The answers will be found in a close-up examination of crabs, anemones, clams, sea stars, urchins, and many others. Feeding and reproductive strategies and more advanced concepts can also be included. Program topics can be tailored specifically for your group. An Educator's Guide is provided. |
| Mount Diablo Beekeepers Association | Community Education Programs | Pleasant Hill | Hoping to know honey bees better? The Mount Diablo Beekeepers Association (MDBA) can help you! We offer the public information booths for large events, and presentations for schools and organizations. Our engaging beekeepers use hands-on materials, photographs, observation hives, and can livestream from their honeybee yards! |
| Oakland Zoo | School ZooMobile - “Home is Where the Habitat Is” - Animal Adaptations & Habitat | Oakland | Why do hedgehogs have spines? Why are snakes missing their legs? Why do some lizards lose their tails? Join us as we explore the world of animal adaptations and how each habitat affects the animals that live there – and vice versa! |
| Oakland Zoo | School ZooMobile - Born to Be Wild | Oakland | So there you were, a helpless little baby in a big, weird world! Did you bundle up when you were cold? Did you make a bottle when you were hungry? Did you do it all by yourself or did you need someone's help? Through our observations, we will learn to recognize patterns in nature that tell us if an animal will be born hapless and helpless, ready to roll, or somewhere in between. |
| Oakland Zoo | School ZooMobile -“Chew On This” - Animal Structures & Survival | Oakland | Everybody is somebody’s lunch in the wild. But, how can you tell who will be the eater, and who will be the eaten? Let’s explore how the body structures of animals – like skulls, feet and beaks – have adapted over time to help them make the most of the food and other resources in their ecosystems. |
| Oakland Zoo | School ZooMobile - Wildlife CSI | Oakland | The illegal wildlife trade is the fourth most lucrative global market, with hundreds of millions of plants and animals captured each year, then traded on the black market. While the problem can seem daunting, there are ways we can help! Using our observation skills, students will learn how to identify items found in the illegal wildlife trade and help develop possible solutions. Rather than feel powerless, students will learn new skills and problem-solving techniques, empowering them to be stewards for wildlife around the globe! |
| Planet Bee | Bee Series & One Day Lessons | San Francisco | Bring live bees to the classroom & give students the experience of a lifetime! When a student has the opportunity to see bees up close, curiosity sparks, fear fades, and gardens become ecological playgrounds. Our hands-on, play-based E-STEM lessons are available as comprehensive series and as individual one-day lessons. Our dynamic classroom program now incorporates a citizen science component, an online teacher’s portal with support lessons, and a donation of native bee house materials for students. All of our lessons are taught by experienced educators and/or certified teachers onsite, and are in line with the Next Generation Science Standards. Sliding scale |
| Point Blue Conservation Science | STRAW (Students and Teachers Restoring A Watershed) | Stinson Beach | STRAW provides classroom and field programs, aligned with science standards, preparing students to restore streams and wetlands. Teachers are provided annual training events and given resources and technical support to integrate watershed science into their classroom year-round. |
| San Francisco Zoo | ZooMobile: Animal Classifications | San Francisco | Students will be introduced to the five classes of animals with a backbone. Similarities and differences in habitats, locomotion, and feeding strategies are discussed. |
| San Francisco Zoo | ZooMobile: Birds Form and Function | San Francisco | Students will be able to see five different birds that have very different lifestyles. The children will learn about feeding strategies, anatomy, and specific adaptations for survival of this diverse group of animals. No hands-on component. |
| San Francisco Zoo | ZooMobile: Habitats | San Francisco | Children will be able to compare life in the desert, the rain forest, and the Bay Area. They will get a first-hand look at some of the animals of these regions and their adaptations for survival. |
| San Francisco Zoo | ZooMobile: The Evolving Reptiles | San Francisco | Reptiles have been on the earth for hundreds of millions of years. Two hundred and thirty million years ago, there were 20 distinct orders of these scaly creatures. Now, there are only four. Learn how these survivors make their way in the modern world. |
| SaveNature.org | Squid Science Dissection | San Francisco | Explore what makes a squid so amazing! How they swim, navigate, defend themselves and hunt. Learn about their anatomy and how an animal’s body is designed for success in the ocean. |
| SaveNature.org | Owl Pellet Discovery | San Francisco | Learn how to be a bone detective while examining how a barn owl digests their prey, or don’t digest their prey. Discover what’s for dinner. |
| SaveNature.org | Insect Discovery Lab | San Francisco | Each presentation includes hands-on experience with live animals and observation time with live and preserved materials. Children will learn how to identify insects and their arthropod relatives, touch amazing arthropod ambassadors, see how insects defend themselves, and discovery their incredible diversity. Students explore the fantastic lives of beetles, millipedes, grasshoppers, walking sticks, whip scorpions, and more. The Insect Discovery Lab immerses students in the extraordinarily diverse world of insects and other arthropods and teaches about their key role in the web of life. Scientific observation, insect identification, and the natural history of bugs' lives are just some of the areas of focus of this program. Classes will receive pre and post visit materials including fact sheets, activity sheets, resource sheets and conservation action guides. Programs are 45-50 minutes long. |
| Suisun Marsh Natural History Association | Suisun Marsh Special Feature In-Class Presentations | Suisun | Choose from many in-class presentation options: • Wildlife Rehabilitation: A presentation covering the rehabilitation efforts of the Suisun Wildlife Center, including an up-close look at some non-releasable wildlife. (30 minute presentation - $ 75 (suitable for pre-school), 45 minutes - $85, 60 minutes - $100, Assembly Presentation - $200) • Reptiles: A look at some native California reptiles combined with a pictorial view of their natural history as well as other North American reptiles. ($100 / 60 minutes. Slide show, Interpreter and Reptile presentation.) • Owls - Silent Hunters of the Night: A audio-visual presentation covering various species of owls and their night calls, including an up close look at some non-releasable local owls. ($100 / 60 minutes. Slide show, Interpreter and non-releasable Owl presentation) |
| The Gardens at Heather Farms | The Power of Pollination | Walnut Creek | Butterflies, bees, and more! Learn about the animals that move pollen from plant to plant to generate seeds and create fruit. Students will discover how pollinators are crucial to a plants' life cycle through a hands-on pollination activity to see how important these tiny animals really are. Find out how pollinators and plants communicate with each other to help our gardens grow and give us the delicious food we enjoy. Students will end class searching for pollinators in our own garden. |
| The Gardens at Heather Farms | Bug Buddies In-Class | Walnut Creek | Peek into the amazing world of insects, the most successful life form on the planet. Young entomologists will observe and handle live mini-beasts to experience a bug's life, learn about creature features, and test their bug IQ. (Also available as a field-trip) 1 hour |
| The Gardens at Heather Farms | Geology Rocks In-Class | Walnut Creek | Learn to read stories hidden in stone as we meet a famous rock group (igneous, metamorphic, sedimentary), take a spin on the rock cycle, bone up on fossils, and discover rocky resources we rely on everyday. (Also available as a field-trip) |
| The Gardens at Heather Farms | Wonderful Worms In-Class | Walnut Creek | Through experiments and observation we'll investigate the hidden life of this fascinating recycler and create a classroom worm bin. (Also available as a field trip) |
| The Gardens at Heather Farms | The Power of Plants | Walnut Creek | Students learn about the parts of a plant and their functions. We will discuss what plants need to survive and why pollinators and wind are so important to plant reproduction. Students work together to dissect a plant and see the parts up close. They learn and identify each part of a seed and its function. |
| The Monterey Bay Salmon and Trout Project | Salmon and Trout Education Program (STEP) | Davenport | In early February each year the STEP team trains new teachers to present the curriculum to their students. The two-day weekend workshop has one day in the field and in the creek studying the salmon habitat. After taking the training the teachers are qualified to apply to MBSTP for eggs to incubate. The incubation experience has had a very high success rate over the 35-year history. Not only are the kids inspired, but greater than 95% of the eggs hatch and the resulting fry are successfully released into their native habitat. |
| Tilden Nature Area-Tilden Regional Park | Naturalist visit to your classroom! | Berkeley | Can’t make it to the park? We’ll come to you! Program topics include: reptiles, spiders, Native American Lifestyles and more! |
| Wildcare | Nature Van-Mammals | San Rafael | Nature Van programs bring the field trip to the classroom. Guided by professional science educators, the Nature Van teaches students about animal characteristics, adaptations, and food webs — all without leaving school. Presentations are designed for a single classroom; this is not a multi-class assembly program. Pre-K and Kindergarten programs last 45 minutes. Programs for 1st through 5th grades last sixty minutes, although shorter presentations are available upon request. Delve into the world of marsupials, mustelids, felines, canines, and rodents. Discover what makes a mammal a mammal and why humans are included in this amazing group. |
| Wildcare | Nature Van - California Wildlife | San Rafael | In "California Wildlife," uncover the diversity of California’s wildlife and the way our native animals have adapted to their habitat as we examine predator-prey relationships, defense strategies and the natural history of mammal, birds, and reptiles that are our wild neighbors. Nature Van programs bring the field trip to the classroom. Guided by professional science educators, the Nature Van teaches students about animal characteristics, adaptations, and food webs — all without leaving school. Presentations are designed for a single classroom; this is not a multi-class assembly program. Pre-K and Kindergarten programs last 45 minutes. Programs for 1st through 5th grades last sixty minutes, although shorter presentations are available upon request. |