- Objectives
- To introduce children to salt water.
- To introduce
children to fish.
- To introduce children to sand.
- To introduce children
to other sea life.
- Introduction
- Have
you ever gone to the ocean? What about it is different than
your bath water or swimming pool?
- What lives in the ocean?
- Is the sand near the ocean
different than what you have in your backyard? Than what is
in your sandbox? (Yes, since
the purchased sand is sterilized
and does not taste salty.)
- What is different about what
lives by the sea/ocean rather than what is in your backyard?
- Program
- Depending
on the age and ability of your students, this can be mostly
a hands on touching and observing program.
- Try matching skills--use
some of the games for matching similar
types of sea life, sorting the sea animals by color, type or
whether in the
water or near the water, etc.
- Listen to the tape and
learn songs about sea life.
- Look at and touch the shells.
Feel the different texture. Listen to the spiral ones to hear
the
ocean. Use a
magnifying glass to inspect
them more closely.
- Include some of the facts listed
below which might be of interest.
- Make a sample of salt water
with approximately 1/8 tsp. of table salt to 1 cup of water
to allow
children
to taste it. Remember it doesn’t
have to be exact since the ocean salinity varies
from beach to beach.
- Have the children move like
sea or sand life--see some movement suggestions
below.
- Tail from side to side for most fish
- Tail
up and down for whales
- Scallop opens and closes shell quickly
to move
- Squid takes in water and forces it
out to jet forward or backward
- Jellyfish
opens its body up like and umbrella and then rapidly closes
it to jet upward
- Porcupine fish
looks like other fish when relaxed, but when feeling
in danger
it swallows
water
or air and inflates to two
to three times its normal size.
Its spines
then swivel outward
to further frighten enemies.
After danger passes, it
slowly deflates
and swims on its way
- Definitions and explanations
- Sand
- finely crushed rocks
- Ocean - body of water that covers nearly
70% of the world and contains 97% of all the water on the earth.
It is 3.5% salt.
Saltier in warmer subtropical regions with greater evaporation
of the fresh part of the
water. Least salty around the equator where there
is a greater rainfall to neutralize the salt.
- Salt - comes
chiefly from the wearing away of rocks on land. Yes, people
can and do
eat the salt from the ocean. Helps an
object float
in water.
- Barnacles - small animals with very
hard shells
- Seaweed - plants that live in the ocean (Otters
wrap themselves in kelp to keep them afloat
when they are sleeping or resting. They also
keep their fur clean to have it airy and
light to help keep them from sinking.)
- Tide - the rising and falling
of the water near the shore caused by the pull of the
moon's gravity
on the earth.
- Waves - most are caused by
the wind
- Fish - true fish have backbones,
fins and gills
- Invertebrates - animals
without backbones such as jellyfish, sea star
and shellfish
(snails, crabs,
scallops, mussels)
- Mammals - warm
blooded, give birth to live young and feed their babies
with milk--these
include
whales, seals, walruses and dolphins
- Human
blood, tears, urine and other liquids are the same salt
content as
the ocean.
- General
- Some
children will not want to touch any of the shells or objects
having a presumed fear of them. After further discussion
and exploration they may come around independently.
- Remind
children that shells and some of the other objects can be sharp
and also fragile.
- If facility allows it, you may want to make
a salt water solution to put in a bowl or other container and
submerge some
of the shells or
plastic sea animals in the water to see if they look
or feel different to the children.
- Have children put a hand
in a salt water solution and also in a tap water solution.
After removing
and air drying, see if they notice anything
different. (May be able to see the dried salt on
hand, may feel sticky, may taste different when licked...)
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