Year 1: Animals, including humans
This list consists of lesson plans, activities and video clips to support the teaching of Animals, including humans in Year One. It contains tips on using the resources, suggestions for further use and background subject knowledge. Possible misconceptions are highlighted so that teachers may plan lessons to facilitate correct conceptual understanding. Designed to support the new curriculum programme of study it aims to cover many of the requirements for knowledge and understanding and working scientifically. The statutory requirements are that children are taught to:
• identify and name a variety of common animals including fish, amphibians, reptiles, birds and mammals
• identify and name a variety of common animals that are carnivores, herbivores and omnivores
• describe and compare the structure of a variety of common animals (fish, amphibians, reptiles, birds and mammals, including pets)
• identify, name, draw and label the basic parts of the human body and say which part of the body is associated with each sense.
Visit the primary science webpage to access all lists.
Wildlife Watch *suitable for home learning*
This extremely usesful pack contains a range of spotter sheets, which can be laminated and taken out when visiting the local environment. Colourful pictures help young children in identifying animals and plants. It includes sheets to identify mammals, birds and minibeasts.
British Birds
Use the first 50 seconds with the sound muted to draw children's attention to some of the birds found in the UK. Watch it again and stop the clip at various birds and ask children to describe them. Supplement this with enlarged images of common birds or the spotter sheet in the previous resource and discuss how we can recognise commonly found birds.
This could be followed by a trip to a local environmental area where children may then try to identify some of the birds they see.
Animals, including humans: ourselves
This collection of lesson plans and activities supports learning about the human body and senses. Children work scientifically to observe changes over time and think about the question how do we change as we get older? They also collect data, look for patterns and carry out investigations.
Classification Activity Pack
A range of indoor and outdoor practical activities, suitable for primary learners. Activities are designed to help children identify and name a variety of common plants and animals and link to work on minibeasts, habitats and classification. Many of the activities are cross-curricular, providing opportunities to develop skills in literacy, mathematics, art and computing.
Activities include:
*Making your own pooter
*Pond dipping
*Identification and classification games
*Investigating camouflage
*Making a wormery
Nocturnal Animals (Age 5 to 7)
This activity looks at how nocturnal animals use their senses to find their way around their habitat in the dark. As well as learning about nocturnal animals this activity asks children to use senses other than sight to identify mystery objects and animals from the sounds they make. As humans we rely heavily upon our sense of sight so these activities raise awareness of the importance of the other senses for survival.
Brilliant Bodies
Find out about the parts of the human body and work scientifically recognising the similarities and differences between human bodies and the importance of exercise for humans.
It uses the context of a character Fizzy, who wants to learn more about the human body and explain this to her dog Dizzy. A puppet used to represent Fizzy could help engage younger learners. The resource includes homework ideas and a reward card.
Main parts of the human body
An animated sequence that tours the human body, picturing and naming the main body parts and describing what they do. The skeleton, skull, skin, head, neck, arms, elbows, arms, fingers, chest, legs, knees, feet and toes are all visited.
Badger Science: Foundation and Key Stage One
Young children may have very different ideas about what is living. Some may think if a thing moves then it is alive and might believe that fire is alive because it moves. At this level children may not have noticed all of the characteristics of living things and may list only some such as; breathing, eating, drinking and moving.
Pages 12 and 13 on the pdf looks at what it means to be alive. Children find similarities and differences between animals and could go on to compare how the animals move and the foods they eat. Children could be given pictures of a range of animals and sort them according to: how they move, where they live, whether they have fur, feathers or scales?
Ginn Science Activity Sheets: Year One
Most children should be able to identify the main body parts of humans. Pages11-17 of the pdf looks at the main body parts and goes on to look at variation in height and size of hands and feet within the class. Carrying out a survey such as this is a great way of working scientifically to find out about the world. Children could draw around their hands, cut the hand shapes out and arrange them in order to see the variation.
Looking at body parts may be extended to looking at other animals as well as humans. Show a variety of animal images and ask children to find the main body parts and compare them to humans. This will help children see that humans and animals share similar features as we are all animals. Children often see humans as separate to animals.
Flavour Sense
A whole od resources, that could be used as part of a full length project on the senses. They explore the connection between our senses and how they influence our perception of food. Children explore how the sense of smell is an important aspect of tasting food and how difficult it can be to identify food from smell alone. They investigate the difference between taste and flavour and produce a ‘tongue map’ which shows which parts of the tongue are best at identifying which flavours. Children also carry our experiments which show what an important part sight plays in how we experience and describe taste.
