ingridscience

Prepare before the class:
Build lego animal for each student pair. See photo for an example, but any simple creature will work. Make a collection of separate lego pieces to hand to students to replace parts of their lego animal - the pieces do not need to be identical for each student pair (as different DNA mutations can result in different physical changes in an animal.)
Cut out Pangea pieces from https://www.amnh.org/content/download/49383/751589/file/dinos_plate_tec…

Introduce the activity:
Ask students to sit in a large circle, next to a student that they will partner with for this activity.
Assemble the Pangea puzzle and place identical lego animals on different parts of the landmass.
Show students the animals on the landmass, called Pangea, in a population (group).
Tell them that over millions of years, the landmass separated into different continents - demonstrate the land masses separating into our familiar continents. The animals move with their landmass. Tell students that once the animals are separated they start to evolve separately from each other. This activity models how that happens.
(Note that, in reality, it is large populations of animals that are separated and evolve as a group, not single animals. But to convey how random small changes lead to different evolutionary paths, this simplification with single animals is suitable for Elementary students.)

Students model evolutionary change:
Tell students that with their partner, they will be an island with their own lego animal - hand out the lego animals to each student pair.
If students are sitting in a large circle next to their partner, it makes it easier for later steps.
Over time these lego animals have changes to their DNA (called mutations) which might make them look a little different.
Tell students that for the first mutation, one of the students in the pair should take off a piece from their animal. Hand a new lego piece to their partner, who should add it in any place on the lego animal that they like.
(By asking one student to remove a piece and another to replace it with another piece, we are trying to remove as much of the "design" and "thinking ahead" of new animals as possible - evolution does not plan or think ahead - it is a blind process.)
Then students can switch roles with the next lego piece you give them: one of them removes a piece of lego from the animal and their partner adds on the new piece of lego where they like.
After a couple of mutation events, ask students to place their animal towards the centre of the circle, so that everyone can see all animals. Comment that even after only a couple of mutations, the animals living on different islands are already starting to look different from each other.
Then continue with mutation events, each time giving all the student pairs similar, but not necessarily identical, lego pieces. Some of the mutations can effect both sides of the body, so students can be asked to remove two legs and give them two new identical lego pieces to replace them (maybe as wings or other appendages).

If appropriate for the age, stress that in reality not every DNA mutation results in a physical change to an animal's body. We are speeding up evolution in this activity, making every mutation cause a physical change.
In addition, if appropriate for the age, tell the students that, in reality, the only changes that are retained are the ones that allow the animal to survive better in their environment. If there is no survival advantage the mutation might not stay. (There are other mechanism that also account for mutation persistence, such as genetic drift, but these are beyond Elementary level evolution.)

Optional addition to a round of mutations:
Tell each student pair an environmental event that happens on their island e.g. flooding, or a cold period. They should make adaptations on their animal that will help it survive this environmental shift. (Again, evolution does not plan like this - in reality, the mutations that make survival more likely will be the mutations that persist.)

Once the mutations (lego replacement pieces) have all been used, stop the activity, and ask student pairs to each show and explain to the class the adaptations that their animal now has and how they help it survive in their environment.
Add real life examples to the conversation as and if these adaptations are showcased:
The evolution of wings from legs occurred with the evolution of birds, about 150 million years ago (Mya), with Archaeopteryx as the intermediate fossil. Wings also evolved in Pterosaurs (flying dinosaurs) 225 Mya, in bats (60 Mya) and in insects (400 Mya) - so flight evolved four independent times through evolution.
The evolution of legs into fins and also tails into a flippers happened when whales evolved from land animals, about 50 million years ago. (Hippos are the closest living land animal relatives of whales.)
(Another major evolutionary event which will likely not be demonstrated with the lego animals, is when life moved onto land: tetrapods (animals that walk on land) evolved from fish, with fins evolving into legs, about 390 million years ago. The discovery of the Tiktaalik in Nunavut was some excellent science that looked for and found the missing link fossil.)

Wrap up and summarize:
In the same way that your lego creatures evolved different features on each of your islands, living things have evolved along separate evolutionary paths from a common relative, when they were separated on different islands or continents. On the separated islands, the different populations respond to different evolutionary pressures (e.g. different climate) which result in the evolution of features that allow survival in each environment.
The longer a population has been separated, the more different it will look from its relatives on another land mass. We find these changes in both fossils and living things that are alive today.
By studying where different animals are found on Earth and the fossils found in each landmass, scientists construct an evolutionary tree of all living things.

To obtain the glockenspiel keys (which are expensive), music teachers replace their collection as the pads wear out.
Old glockenspiel keys that have lost their pads can be repaired: obtain sticky felt pads made to go under the base of chair legs, and cut them to size to replace the glockenspiel pads. To make a cheap mallet, tightly wrap a thick elastic band around the wide end of a chopstick.

Hand out glockenspiel keys and mallets to the students.
Ask students to compare their note to their neighbour - help them hear the higher and lower notes (which can be tricky for a novice ear).
Students may need to be spaced out to hear their own sounds over the rest of the class.
Then ask students if the longer glockenspiel note is lower or higher than the shorter glockenspiel note. Once all students have arrived at a conclusion summarize what they find: the Longer note makes the Lower sound (both start with L).

Relate the glockenspiel length and note change to other instruments:
On a ukelele or guitar or violin, a longer string makes a lower note than when the string is made shorter by placing the finger on it.
Note that the size and tension of the string also makes a difference to the note made, so this comparison should only be made using a single string.
For wind instruments, the longer larger instruments make lower notes than the shorter smaller instruments.
On a piano, the lower notes are made by longer strings.

Discuss how the glockenspiel notes make a sound:
When the bar is hit by the mallet it starts the bar vibrating.
The vibrating bar makes the air molecules around it vibrate. The vibrations travel outwards from the bar until they reach our ears. The vibrating air molecules makes our ear drums vibrate, so that we can then perceive the sound.

Students can visualize the vibrations of the glockenspiel bar by placing small rocks on the bar. (Note: this will chip any paint on the bar.) When they hit the bar with the mallet the rocks bounce up and down. The rocks continue to bounce as the note (and vibrations) linger after the first hit.

This activity adapted from Exploratorium Cuica activity: www.exploratorium.edu/video/cuica-activity-step-step-demonstration.
It is very loud, so best outdoors.

Prepare the cups for the students:
Use the straightened paper clip to make a hole in the bottom of each cup. The hole should be easily wide enough to thread the string through. If the cups are plastic, heat up the paper clip to push it through the plastic without breaking it. (Plastic cups recommended for longer-lasting noise makers.)

Give each student a cup with a hole in it, a length of string, a paperclip.
Demonstrate how to thread the string through the hole into the cup, then knot the end of the string around the paperclip to hold the string in the cup. If necessary, use large rope to model how to tie the knot.

The students hold the cup in one hand and run their fingers of the other hand down the string, pinching the string between their thumb and pointer finger.
They can first try with a dry string, to make sure they all have the motion correct, and to contrast the (lack of) sound made with the next step.
Then they dip their fingers in water, before running them down the string again. A loud squawking sound is made.

Students can put a small rock or bead in their cup and watch it as they make the sound. The rock should bounce around, maybe giving students a clue as to how the sound is made.
The sound is made as the wet fingers slip and grip their way along the string, making it vibrate. This vibration is transferred to the cup (as seen by the bouncing rock). The vibrating cup makes the air inside it vibrate. The vibration transmits through the air to your ear, where it vibrates the eardrum and we sense the sound.

Cups of different sizes make different sounds: the smaller cups make a higher note.
Cups of the same size made from different materials do not make noticeably different sounds.

Distribute sheets to students.

For young primaries use instead of a thermometer to measure how warm or cold water is, or to show how we can measure temperature. (Then show them a thermometer.)

For outdoor activity, all grades, using the sun's radiation:
Allow them to discover that the sun changes the colour of the sheets.
Give them the colour scale (for my sheets, coolest is black, then getting warmer is red, orange, yellow, blue, then black again, so black can either be coolest or warmest).
Allow students to explore the environment with their sheet.
If they need suggestions, see the photos:
block the sun's radiation with your hand/playground structure to make an image on the sheet
use the sheet to measure how warm different playground structures are
use the sheet to measure relative heat given off by differently-coloured walls
use a heat pad to change the colour of the sheet
use tubs of cool or warm water to cool and warm the sheet respectively
use drips of water to make patterns and paint on the sheet

For an indoor activity, older primaries and up, use infra red heat lamps.
Students 'charge' their sheets at the heat lamp (by radiation). Then quickly press the sheets to surfaces and objects in the classroom, where they will lose their heat by conduction.
Or students can heat up the sheets with their hands, speeding it up with friction (rubbing sheet against hands or carpet).

Discuss what kinds of heat transfer heated the sheets up:
Radiation from the sun.
Conduction when the sheet is pressed against a surface or water draws heat from the sheet.

Use the sheets to determine whether something is a conductor or insulator (best done as a class in a circle at a carpet);
All together, press hand on the sheet for 5 seconds, then see the colour change as it heats up.
Then, once the sheets have cooled again, lay tin foil over the sheet and press hands for 5 seconds again - the same heated pattern emerges. Tin foil is a 'conductor' of heat.
Then, once the sheets have cooled again, lay felt over the sheet and press hand for 5 seconds again - no colour as the felt blocks heat from transferring from the hand to the sheet. The felt is an 'insulator'.

Water cools the sheet really fast, and makes awesome patterns if water is dripped or painted on the warm sheet.

Use heat sensitive sheets to show how a tool like this helps us detect subtle changes in heat (show Infra red images) whereas some animals have their own sense organs which can detect these changes e.g. snakes.

Take students outdoors, to the staff parking lot, or to a safe view of a street with cars passing.
Ask students what colour cars they see, then ask them to write the colours on their paper.
Students then tally the numbers of each car colour that they see in the lot, or as the cars pass by.

Graph the results: students can either make their own graph of their results or their group's results, or a class graph can be made together, using a commonly recorded car number for each colour (although students are looking at the same cars, they will likely record different numbers of each colour from each other).

Make a set of moon phases cards for each table group or each student.
I use 16 images from a NASA page: https://spaceplace.nasa.gov/oreo-moon/en/Moon_phases_all_L.en.jpg

Ask them to place them in order in a circle.
Note that ordering these cards is tricky if one is not familiar with the sequence already. Depending on the students' prior knowledge of the phases of the moon, provide images to help them order their cards into a circle.

Image of the phases of the moon around Earth, which students basically copy to place their cards: https://www.moonconnection.com/moon_phases.phtml

Image of the Moon showing its features, so students know which way up to orient their cards: https://www.nasa.gov/centers/langley/images/content/528691main_Super_Mo…
Interesting Moon features explained:
Dark areas are lava flows from when the moon was younger (basalt).
The round circles are craters from chunks of rock, or meteorites hitting the moon.
All the mountains are formed by impacts, as the moon does not have tectonic plates.
The moon has mountains and craters (tallest mountain over half the height of Everest on Earth).

Depending on how hard the puzzle is for students, they can be started off with 8 cards (recommended for grade 3/4) and then add in the others.

Take students outdoors where there are several bushes and trees.
Show students how to identify the pattern of leaves on the branches of trees or bushes - look a little way down the stem where the leaves are more spaced out. In the winter, when deciduous leaves have dropped, look at the pattern of the leaf buds. Draw on paper/portable white board to make the pattern clear.

Alternate: one leaf emerges from one side of the stem, the next leaf along from the other side.
Opposite: two leaves emerge from the same place on the stem, but on different sides.
Whorled: several leaves emerge from the same place on the stem.

Identify the trees as they are studied.
I found this free Vancouver Street Trees iphone App which identifies trees on Vancouver streets by location.

Students can use a map to mark where they found each kind of pattern.
Or they can make a Venn diagram of the plants they find and the growth pattern(s) they exhibit.
Note that different students may see different patterns in the same tree. Sometimes the patterns are not clear, especially if the leaves are close together at the tip of the stem.

Extension: look at the patterns of the veins in leaves (opposite or alternate) and compare to the leaf growth pattern from the stem in the same plant.

Discussion:
Although leaves have different patterns in how they grow, all the patterns ensure that the leaves are well spaced out around the stem. This allows each leaf to catch as much light as possible for the plant.
Through evolution, leaves that spread their leaves out were at an advantage over other plants, and this adaptation persisted.

The actual mechanism for leaf growth patterns (called phyllotaxis) involves a molecule called auxin, and is a current area of research.
Auxin is constantly flowing up the stem towards the growing tip. Where there is a lot of auxin, a new leaf grows. Auxin is drawn towards where a new leaf is growing, and is pulled away from the surrounding areas, depleting them of auxin. This means, as more auxin moves up the stem, it collects in areas further away from the last leaf. Once enough auxin builds up a new leaf grows, on the other side of the stem from the last leaf.
See this webpage for a visual: https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Model-for-the-role-of-polar-auxin-t…

The growth of all living things is a result of their molecules flowing, interacting and changing, setting up patterns that we see in the structure of plants and animals e.g. patterns of ribs or body segments.

Please note that in a class of students it is likely that one of them is at least partially colourblind (1 in 12 males are colourblind). As this is an activity distinguishing colours, these students will not be able to tell some colours apart and perceive some colours differently, although the activity will be no less interesting for them. The common red/green colour blindness means reds and greens (or colours containing reds and greens such as browns) look similar. More information at colourblindawareness.org and colorblindguide.com/post/the-advantage-of-being-colorblind.

This is an engaging activity. Student get involved in creating works of art that look like the surroundings.

Students work in pairs, or maximum groups of three. Each group has a pipe cleaner square and a tub of small pieces of modelling clay in a variety of colours.
Each group decides where to place their pipe cleaner square.

While one (or two) student(s) looks away, the other student makes a small ball of modelling clay of one colour, and places it in the square. The clay cannot have anything placed on top of it - it must be in plain sight.
The second student then looks and tries to find the clay.
Then the students switch tasks.
Black and brown modelling clay is often the hardest to find outdoors, matching the dirt between grass blades.
This kind of camouflage is an example of "colour matching". Animals are often colour matched to their environment to make them harder to find.

Another kind of camouflage is "disruptive colouration" where a living thing is more than one colour, maybe with spots or stripes. The different colours break up the outline of the living thing and make it harder to see.
Another level of camouflage is to have an "irregular outline", so the shape of the object is not what is expected. Some fish have decorated heads, or insects look like a leaf.
Students can try adding these layers of camouflage to their colour matching, by adding different colours of clay and changing the shape of their clay before hiding it. The final object should be about the same size of the first ball (as a tiny speck of clay will be an unfair challenge).

Examples of outdoor variations that students came up with: making a long piece of clay to look like a stick on the ground, or a piece of gray and black clay shaped to look like other little rocks on the ground, matching the colour of peeling paint on a fence, or even matching the colour of bird poop on a rock! (see this website for animals camouflaging to look like bird poop: https://www.sciencefocus.com/nature/heres-looking-at-poo-the-weird-and-…)
Examples of indoor variations include hiding colours in a collection of coloured art supplies, or adding extra coloured patches to coloured tags. Posters or other flat materials are easier for finding hidden clay on, as the clay is the only raised part and reflects the light differently.

Students can spend quite a while making works of art that can be a challenge to find by most in the class. Student groups and adults will enjoy visiting particularly challenging hides.

Please note the likelihood of a colourblind student in the class. Colourblindness can also be an advantage:
https://lifeonsphere.com/color-blind-people-can-spot-and-see-through-ca…
https://www.science.org/content/article/eye-camouflage#:~:text=Being%20….

Animals using different methods of camouflage:
https://www.bbcearth.com/news/8-creatures-that-are-masters-of-disguise

Webpages with lists of camouflage types:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_camouflage_methods
https://www.eecis.udel.edu/~vijay/BLAST/Lesson_5.html