Learning Intention: To ask questions about minibeasts..

Brainstorm with your buddy what a mini beast is. What animals could be a minibeast? 

Now look at the picture of a mini beast with your partner.

What questions do you have about your minibeast? Write your questions on post it notes.

Write the name and draw a picture of your favourite minibeast.

Are minibeasts living things? Let's make a class definition of a minibeast.

Fig. 1: These are all minibeasts - can you name each one?

Learning Intention: To identify features of insects.

Watch Life of Insects by David Attenborough.

With a partner, discuss what was your favourite part of the clip.

Now as a class, let's record information we learnt about insects.

• Name as many insects as you can.
• Where do insects live?
• What do insects eat and drink?
• Is an ant strong? How do you know?
• How do insects stay safe?
• What sort of insects live in the desert?
• Why is teamwork important for insects?
• Are they living things?

Using the title headings of arachnids, insects and arthropods, sort names and pictures of minibeasts into their correct families.

Learning Intention: To understand that mini beasts are living things.

Let's read and discuss Hey, Little Ant.

In a Timed-Pair-Share, discuss your favourite part.

Let's make a list of all the reasons for squishing/not squishing an ant

Now write your own persuasive argument about why a minibeast of your choice shouldn't be "squished". Draw a picture to support your argument.

Fig. 3: Hey Little Ant

Learning Intention: To understand how we should treat minibeasts.

Let's watch an excerpt from Dot and Keeto.

Let's discuss:

• How should we treat minibeasts?
• What purpose do minibeasts have in our ecosystem?
• Compare small size to human size.
• What did we learn?

Write your reflection in your book.

Learning Intention: To generalise the features of what makes an arachnid, insect or arthropod.

Let's search for minibeasts.

How many minibeasts are in your hula hoop?

Write your observations in your book and draw the minibeasts you observed. How are they the same and different? 

Are they arachnids, insects or arthropods? How do you know?

Fig. 5: What sort of minibeast is this? How do you know?

Learning Intention: To understand why minibeasts are important to us.

Listen to the presentation about minibeasts?

Think-Pair-Share: What was your favourite part? What was one important fact that you learned about minibeasts?

Now let's complete a T-Chart about the similarities and differences you can see between the mini beasts.

Let's take our learning further. Why are minibeasts important?

First, let's look at two food chains. As minibeasts are living things they need to eat and drink. From the picture below, what do they eat? What eats them? What would happen if we took the minibeast out?

Fig. 6: Food Chain

Fig. 6a: Grassland Food Chain in Australia

 Now think about how this affects humans.

Could we survive without them? Why/why not?

Learning Intention: To identify the features and life cycle of arthropods.

Brainstorm what we know about butterflies (arthropods) in one colour.

Now let's read The Very Hungry Caterpillar.

Think-Pair-Share: What was your favourite part? Add more things you now know about arthropods to your brainstorm.

Let's create a life cycle with pictures and words.

Identify the parts of a butterfly.

Make a 3D butterfly and glue it to an A4 piece of paper. Label the butterfly and write your name on it.

Fig. 7: The Very Hungry Caterpillar

Make a 3D butterfly and glue it to an A4 piece of paper. Label the butterfly and write your name on it.

To show what you have learnt, cut and glue the pictures and words in the right order to make a butterfly life cycle.

Learning Intention: To find interesting facts about ants and understand why ants are important.

Record three cool facts about ants.

Share your facts with a partner and then with the class.

Draw and label a picture of an ant. What are some of its features?

Let's use some of the facts in a class information report.

Now write your own information report using your three facts.

BIG QUESTION: What role do ants play in our ecosystem? Why are they important?

Jigsaw Activity

Each person in the class will be assigned a number from 1-4 in a home group of 4 people. 

1. All the ones then form a group. You will be given the following information.

Efficient cleaners: Ants act as decomposers by feeding on organic waste, insects or other dead animals. They help keep the environment clean. Carpenter ants, which make their nests in dead or diseased wood, considerably accelerate the decomposition process of timber. After the ants leave, fungi and bacteria grow in the galleries and break down the lignin and cellulose on large surfaces.

Each person in the group should draw a picture to illustrate the information their group has been given. Make sure you understand the information as you will have to explain it with your drawing to the people in your home group.

2. All the twos then form a group. You will be given the following information:

Ants eat: Ants are predators of other insects and their eggs. Ants eat little insects that are alive or dead, honey dew, nectar and will eat sweets like sugar, syrup and jelly. 

Each person in the group should draw a picture to illustrate the information their group has been given. Make sure you understand the information as you will have to explain it with your drawing to the people in your home group.

3. All the threes then form a group. You will be given the following information:

Ants are eaten: In their natural habitat, they are a source of food for many invertebrates and vertebrates, including woodpeckers and other insectivorous insects. Bears attack the trees where carpenter ants live to eat ant larvae and pupae.

Each person in the group should draw a picture to illustrate the information their group has been given. Make sure you understand the information as you will have to explain it with your drawing to the people in your home group.

4. All the fours then form a group. You will be given the following information:

Front line workers: By digging galleries and tunnels, ants help to aerate the soil. They till the soil by bringing pebbles and particles to the top. Like many other species of ants, carpenter ants are also efficient workers.

Each person in the group should draw a picture to illustrate the information their group has been given. Make sure you understand the information as you will have to explain it with your drawing to the people in your home group.

When you return to your home group, you will be the expert and your job is to teach others about what you learnt.

Fig. 8: An ant

Learning Focus: To understand the different roles of ants in a colony.

Watch and listen for facts about ants as you watch excerpts from A Bug's Life.

Record as a class.

Create a wanted poster or ad for the ant that you want in your colony (E.g. If it's a soldier ant, it must be strong, etc.).

Learning Intention: To understand why bees are important.

Watch the YouTube video: Why do we Need bees?.

Discuss what you learnt with a partner. Record three cool facts about bees in an information report.

Now let's make a class chart.

BIG QUESTION: What role do bees play in our ecosystem? Why are they important?

Learning Intention: To understand the importance of flies.

Let's read some information about flies from eHow:

The Importance of Flies By Nicholas Rossillo

Though often considered pests, the common fly is nature's friend.
The common fly is not just a pest that breeds in dog waste and annoys human beings in their living rooms and at picnics. Flies are insects that play an important role in agriculture, in the food chain and in pollinating flowers. In fact, once you grasp just how much everyday ordinary houseflies actually do, seeing them in a whole new light isn't difficult.

Identification

Well over 100,000 species of flies are in existence. Flies belong to an order of insects called Diptera. Flies have two wings, six legs and two halteres, which are organs that allow the fly to maintain its balance and are found at the wings' base. The common housefly is also distinguishable by its compound eyes. Flies can be found in every part of the world except the North and South Poles.

Pollination

Bees are famous pollinators, but flies play a key role in pollinating flowers as well. They visit flowers to eat nectar or lay eggs, and as they travel from flower to flower, they carry pollen on their feet. Flowers that let off a strong smell are especially appealing to flies. Among the many flowers all over the globe that depend on flies for pollination are African starfish flowers, southern California's stapelia gigantean and the Dutchman's pipe of South America.

Pest Control

Flies also play a critical role in ensuring the world's food supply isn't eaten up by other insects. Many insects, in fact, that flies feast on would otherwise become agricultural pests, including beetle grubs, moth caterpillars and aphids. (Maggots eat aphids.) Some farmers will go so far as to introduce various types of flies -- especially fruit flies -- into their farms rather than rely solely on pesticides.

The Food Chain

Flies have an important place in the food chain, too, serving as a plentiful source of food for many creatures. Bats eat flies, for example, as do amphibians and many different species of fish all over the world, including many endangered species of fish. Even the waste that maggots release is beneficial: this waste supplies nutrients to many different forms of mold and fungi.

With your partner, list 3 interesting facts about flies.

Write 2 facts about why they are important.

Class discussion: What are some ways that we can stop flies that are minibeasts from annoying us without killing them?

Fig. 11: Some flies are beautiful - look closely at its features. With a partner, describe them.

Learning Intention: To share what you know about spiders and learn more interesting facts.

Rally Robin what you know about spiders (where they live, appearance, what they eat) and what experiences you have had with spiders.

How do you feel about spiders? Would you keep one as a pet? Why/Why not? Why are spiders important to our ecosystem?

Using assorted books and the internet, find facts about spiders.

Draw a circle in the middle of a page and in it, draw a picture of a spider. Then create a concept map of all the facts you can find out about spiders.

Fig. 12: An example of a concept map about spiders

Include facts on appearance, habitat and how to treat them when discovered.

Now let's find out what to do if you or a friend are bitten by a spider. Lets go to a website - Kids' Health-Spider Bites to learn more.

Let's make a class chart of what to if you or a friend a bitten by a spider.

Learning Intention: To compare and contrast spiders and insects.

Are spiders insects? Why/Why not?

What do they have in common? What is different?

Work with a partner. One person labels a picture of a spider and the other labels an insect. List interesting facts around the diagram.

Spider	Insect

After labelling, let's make a class Venn Diagram of insects and spiders.

Learning Intention: To understand what is a predator and what is a prey. 

Have you ever seen a spider on a web? Why are they there? What do they use webs for? Look at the different webs. Find others on the Internet. Draw a picture of your favourite one.

Why do spiders hide? Spiders like to eat minibeasts. What likes to eat spiders? Spiders are living things so they need to eat and drink.

Draw a picture of a food chain with a spider, its prey and its predator.

Describe your picture.

Fig. 14: A wolf spider and its prey

Learning Intention: To apply what you have learned about spiders in an information report.

Spiders are EVERYWHERE

Research a spider of your choice. Write an information report following these headings.

• Where do you find this spider?
• What does it eat and drink?
• What job does this spider do in the environment?
• Draw a picture of the spider.
• Life Cycle:  Complete a life cycle of a spider and add some cool facts around it.

Creative Task:

Now it's time to be really imaginative and create your own fanatstic minibeast. It could be a spider or an insect or a combination.

Fig. 15: Many minibeasts are already fantastic, like this Phidi, a harmless jumping spider in the USA