Teacher sheet · Ages 6–7 · about 45–50 minutes
Up and down the rainforest
Lesson page: echoesof.science/school/rainforests/ages-6-7/ · Pupil worksheet: echoesof.science/school/rainforests/ages-6-7/print/
Learning aims
- Rainforests are warm, wet forests mostly near the Equator.
- A rainforest has layers: tall emergent trees, the canopy, the understory and the dark forest floor.
- Most animals live up in the trees; rainforests hold a huge variety of living things.
- Leaves release water, which we can catch in a bag.
Lesson plan
| Time | Activity |
|---|---|
| 5 min | Starter: rainforest sounds or pictures. Where do you think the animals are? |
| 10 min | Read the text; build a 'rainforest tower' with pupils standing, kneeling and sitting for the layers. |
| 10 min | Set up the leaf bag experiment (check the next day). |
| 5 min | Top or bottom? game. |
| 5 min | Quiz. |
| 10 min | Worksheet drawing. |
Materials for the experiment
- A clear plastic bag (a sandwich bag)
- A string or a twist tie
- A leafy plant or a low tree branch outside, in the sun
- A second bag with nothing in it, closed the same way
Safety: Only use plants you know are safe to touch; an adult chooses the plant. Do not pull branches down. Keep plastic bags away from faces. Wash hands afterwards.
Common misconceptions
| Pupils may think… | Actually… |
|---|---|
| Rainforests are full of light. | The canopy blocks most light, so the forest floor is dark. |
| Most animals live on the ground. | Most rainforest animals live among the leaves and branches. |
| Plants only take water in; they do not give any out. | Leaves give off water vapour all the time. |
Worksheet answers
- A drawing showing tall trees, a canopy and a dark floor with leaves, and one animal.
- Dark.
- Water drops (the empty bag stays dry).
Quiz answers
- What is the weather like in a tropical rainforest? Warm and wet. It rains a lot and never freezes.[1]
- What is the thick green roof of treetops called? The canopy. The canopy blocks a lot of the sunlight.[2][4]
- Where is it darkest in the rainforest? On the forest floor. Very little sunlight reaches the ground.[3]
- Where do most rainforest animals live? Up in the leaves and branches. Most animals live among the leaves and branches.[2]
- What comes out of leaves that you can catch in a bag? Water. Leaves let out water vapour that turns into drops in the bag.[7]
Going further
Find the Amazon, Central Africa and Indonesia on a globe. Are they near the Equator? Then make a layered rainforest picture as a class mural.
Sources used in this lesson
- [1] Mission: Biomes – Tropical rainforest (NASA Earth Observatory (Mission: Biomes)): reliability High
- [2] Rainforest (summary) (Encyclopaedia Britannica): reliability High
- [3] Rain forest (National Geographic Society (Education resource library)): reliability Medium-high
- [4] Rainforest layers (Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute): reliability High
- [5] The Amazon makes its own wet season (NASA Earth Observatory): reliability High
- [6] Evapotranspiration and the water cycle (U.S. Geological Survey (Water Science School)): reliability High
- [7] Transpiration bag (Water cycle for kids) (U.S. Geological Survey (Water Science School)): reliability High
Full list with links and a note on each source's reliability: echoesof.science/school/rainforests/sources/
Privacy: the lesson pages have no ads, no tracking and no cookies. Quiz answers and game scores stay in the pupil's browser. A short video for each age is coming.