Departments : Teaching Day-by-Day :
Teaching Day-by-Day: Trees
School's begun and things are looking up. Let's look at trees – all kinds of trees – this month.
- Week One - The real thing. Let's start with real trees, the ones that surround us but that we barely notice.
- Have your students look closely at the bark of trees on their way to school. They should stop and make crayon rubbings of some of the trees. Did they notice which trees have deeply grooved bark and which have smooth bark? The class can then compare their rubbings.
- Students should take bark samples from cut wood in woodpiles or from fallen trees. As a class, identify the bark rubbings and samples using books about trees.
- Ask your class to pick leaves from different trees. Press and wax the leaves and then use books to identify your leaves. Together as a class, label and categorize them.
- Use the material you've gathered this week to make a tree identification book for trees in your area. Bind the book and have your class place it in the school library.
- Ask the students to take their families on a neighborhood walk. Have them start with the trees in their own yard and see how many everyone can identify.
- Students should make a chart of the various kinds of wood around their houses. See if they can identify those things that are made of the same kind of wood. They can ask an adult to look over their chart and help them make changes if necessary.
- Invite a lumberman, woodcarver or carpenter to come to your class to talk about the different kinds of woods that he or she uses.
- There's considerable controversy about what should be done with the trees in national parks and forests. Do your students think that big, sturdy trees, such as the giant redwoods, should be cut down while they're still healthy or should they be preserved as tourist attractions?
- What does a tree in a wooded area need and what needs it? With the class, make a diagram of an ecosystem for the tree. What food and other nutrients does it require? What does it give back to the ecosystem? What plants, animals and other organisms live in, on and off the tree?
- Students use books, encyclopedias and almanacs to find out about the world's tallest tree, oldest tree, widest tree, hardest tree, most unusual tree, etc.
- With your students, make your school yard or local park more beautiful by planting a tree there. First, find out what kind of tree will grow best there, where you can get the tree, what it will need for care and how much money you'll need to raise to buy it. Then find out how to plant it!
- With paper and charcoal, pencils or paint, ask your class to draw or paint their favorite tree. Make sure they look at the tree from many angles before they start their picture. They should also try different ways of painting or drawing the same tree.
- Ask the kids to brainstorm with their families about books, movies, songs, stories, poems and paintings in which trees play an important part. There's the tree that Winnie the Pooh lived in and didn't Tarzan also live in a tree?
- Combine the lists you made yesterday and add to them before going to the library as a class to find more books, movies, songs, etc., in which trees play a part.
- Play a game of "trees on the spot." The person who is "it" points to another person and says, "Book," "Song," "Poem," "Movie" or "Painting." The person pointed to has 15 seconds to name a title of a book, song, movie, etc. in which trees are important.
- Make a mural with literary references to trees. Students should label the source of each saying.
- Ask the class to think about one special tree and list all the words and thoughts they associate with it. They then use their lists to write a poem, song or other description about their tree.
- The students read through books of poetry for a poem about trees that appeals to them. They then look through books of quotations for a quote that has a special meaning to them about trees. Everyone shares their quote with the class.
- The class finds a baby tree that will never make it without their help – for example, one that is growing too close to other trees or is in the middle of a lawn where it will be mowed down. Find a spot where the tree will have a better chance of survival and plant it there.
- Find examples of a family tree. Have your students draw and fill in as many parts as they can of their own family tree. They can fill in full names and dates of birth and draw lines to show relationships. Encourage them to bring in photos of people in their family tree.
- Have each class member, including you, make a large poster using the information from his or her family tree. Leave plenty of room for illustrations, which will come later.
- Each generation on a family tree covers about 20 years. Ask your students to work back and figure out when their ancestors were born. They can then use books in the library to see what kinds of clothes they would've worn and what their hairstyles might have been like.
- Students should use the photographs and the information that they gathered yesterday to illustrate their family tree. They should also include a key that shows which of the items are factual and which are imagined.
- The students use stories about family members or make one up about a person on their family tree. They each will tell their story to the class and the class will have to decide whether or not they are telling the truth.
- Each student should research the family background of a famous person and then make an illustrated family tree for him or her.
- Have each student write a letter to someone who knows more about their family tree.
- We've dealt with outdoor trees and with family trees. How many other trees can your students think of? There are shoe trees, of course. Are they made of shoes? The kids can then make up silly definitions or pictures of other kinds of "trees."
- Ask your students to pick some leaves and trace them. What do the leaves make them think of? Students can make the shapes into something else.
- Students place their leaves in an interesting pattern on a piece of drawing paper. They then dip a toothbrush in tempera paint and draw the brush across a screen over the paper, letting tiny dots of paint fall on the paper. Take away the leaves and have them look at the design they created.
- Put it all together and design a quiz game based on all the information you've gathered this month. Have fun!
Week Two Still up a tree. There's more to do with the trees around us.
Week Three Books up a tree. Trees have inspired writers of all kinds of literature. Let's find trees in books, movies and songs.
Week Four Climbing up the family tree. This week we'll look at a different kind of tree.
Week Five Twigs andbirds. This is a week to deal with odds and ends of trees.
Carol Otis Hurst is a children's book author whose latest book, A Killing in Plymouth Colony, was published by Houghton Mifflin in 2003. Be sure to check out her website at www.carolhurst.com
