RIC-20969 Early years Places - The Rainforest

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The rainforest – 3 Music • All children, sitting in a circle, wear a mask or a laminated picture of a different rainforest creature around their necks. Start with one ‘animal’ in the centre of the circle. The children in the circle chant ‘Deep in the rainforest, what can I see? I see a looking at me’. The child in the middle calls out an animal’s name to complete the chant. The child wearing that mask comes to join him/ her in the centre. Continue until all children have left the circle and are together in the centre. • Laminate coloured pictures of rainforest plants or animals (at least as many as the number of children in the class). Place them, spread out, on the fl oor. Play appropriate music and when the music stops the children must stand on a plant or animal; a selected group will then name their plants or animals. • Listen to recordings of rainforest animal sounds. The children use their voices, body percussion or instruments to re-create the sounds. • Match a given sound to a specifi c plant or animal, rain, waterfall or river. Allocate different children to make each sound. Compose a class ‘rainforest symphony’. • Make up, clap and say simple rhythmic chants for rainforest plants and animals; for example, ‘Venus fl y trap is very happy; Insects get stuck inside ‘cause she’s very snappy’; ‘Blue butterfl y, fl y away. Visit the rainforest another day’. • Read the story Verdi by Janell Cannon, which is about a yellow-coloured baby python. Dance to a favourite song while holding a long strip of yellow wool, crepe paper or material. • Reinforce the concept of the four layers of the rainforest by asking the children to move at different levels—high (emergent), lower (canopy), lower still (understorey) and on the fl oor (for the forest fl oor). Designate different animals at these levels and ask the children to move like them. Include different tempos (slow sloth, quick ant etc.). • Add musical sounds to the telling of a rainforest story that the children act out. Technology (and design) • Make and listen to the sound of the rain in the rainforest using a rain stick. Make the rain stick, with adult assistance, in the following way: Paint a cardboard roll and allow to dry. Cover one end with strong plastic wrap and secure with a rubber band. Place styrofoam packing ‘peanuts’, rice or popping corn in the open end of the roll and then cover the other end in the same way as the fi rst. Tip up and down to make, and listen to, rain. • Practise gluing and joining: fan fold and attach paper legs to the bodies of craft tree frogs; fold small cardboard strips in half to attach the two halves of a paper plate Venus fl y trap together, ensuring they can open and shut; connect cardboard rolls using a skipping rope to make a long python (determine how to stop the rolls from falling off the end); use split pins to make jointed animals. • Provide a variety of threading materials and string or wool to make tribal necklaces, bracelets and anklets. • From pictures of rainforest tribal huts, design and build a rainforest home from natural materials such as sticks and leaves. Design and build a bridge in the same way, testing for strength and durability by placing one or more plastic rainforest animals on it. • Design and build a tall, emergent tree using rolled up newspaper taped in place. • View online stories about children who live in or near the rainforest from . • Visit and play ‘Remember the rainforest’ by matching animal pairs. • Visit to view a virtual rainforest at night and to fi nd printable photographs of animals. • Use dead leaves collected from home or in the playground to create a home for an ant or other insect in the rainforest. • Use construction blocks to design a road or bridge through a rainforest. Provide pictures or books to assist. R.I.C. Publications ® – www.ricpublications.com.au Early years themes—Places—The rainforest 67 ISBN 978-1-74126-966-6
Teacher background information NOTE: For the purposes of accuracy, this unit is titled ‘The rainforest’ instead of ‘The jungle’. This unit introduces animals and plants associated with tropical rainforests. All rainforests are jungles but not all jungles are rainforests. The world’s rainforests occur around the ‘waist’ of the globe, between the tropics of Cancer and Capricorn. Tropical rainforests are always hot and humid because they lie close to the Equator and have a lot of rainfall. The rainforests are home to millions of plant and animal species. The plants consume carbon dioxide and generate oxygen so rainforests are known as the ‘lungs of the planet’. The world’s major tropical rainforests are located in Central and South America, central Africa and Madagascar, Southeast Asia and the Cape York Peninsula of Queensland, Australia. Plants create different layers and habitats within the rainforest: The forest floor is the lowest layer. It is very dark, so there is little or no plant growth. Vegetation that falls decomposes very quickly. Many insects and small creatures can be found on the forest fl oor and up in the trees. Giant anteaters and other large creatures live there. The understorey receives a little sunlight so plants can grow here. They have developed wide leaves to take in as much sunlight as possible. These leaves create more shade on the forest fl oor. Emergent The canopy forms a roof over the layers beneath. It is a network of leaves and branches, teeming with life: insects, birds, reptiles and mammals. The emergent layer contains the tallest trees of the rainforest. Flying creatures such as birds, bats and butterfl ies are found here. Climbers such as monkeys can also reach these treetops. Canopy Plants are the most numerous living things in the rainforest, feeding the insects which in turn become prey to larger but less numerous creatures. The balance of nature in the rainforest is under constant threat from human activity. The extinction of a single species can create a hole in a food web and have a disastrous effect on an ecosystem. Some of the animals in various rainforests around the world, and their diet/prey, are listed on the facing page. Understorey Forest floor Concepts to be developed • A tropical rainforest is found in the hot, humid parts of the world. • There are four layers in the rainforest. • Rainforests are home to many different plants and animals. • Plants and animals feed on each other to form a food web. • Humans affect the rainforest by cutting down trees. • Some people still live in the rainforest. 68 Early years themes—Places—The rainforest www.ricpublications.com.au – R.I.C. Publications ® ISBN 978-1-74126-966-6
Page 1 and 2: EARLY YEARS THEMES Places The rainf
Page 3 and 4: Cross-curricular activities English
Page 5 and 6: Cross-curricular activities Science
Page 7: Cross-curricular activities Visual
Page 11 and 12: Red-eyed tree frog 70 Early years t
Page 13 and 14: Sloth game 1 2 3 72 Early years the
Page 15 and 16: Tiger mask Instructions: Copy onto
Page 17 and 18: Recipes Mango milkshake Ingredients
Page 19 and 20: Display ideas Rainforest layers •
Page 21: Literature resources - 2 Songs, act

RIC-20969 Early years Places - The Rainforest

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