Objectives:

Materials:

Life in the Coral Reef by Bobbie Kalman and Niki Walker
*or similar book about the coral reef
photographs of coral from magazines and books
glue
clay or play dough
toilet paper role
pipe-cleaner
Shoebox
map of the world
Computer with Internet access

Procedure:

• Teacher should collect photos of the coral reef and show them to students.  Explain that the colorful, rigid structures are called coral and that coral is made by tiny animals called polyps that live inside limestone cups.  Students must get into groups of two and find pictures of coral reefs on the Internet.  Share their pictures with the class.
• Distribute the student supplies so each child can make a polyp.  First, Take a piece of clay about the size of a marshmallow. (The polyps body) Cut the pipe cleaner in half and poke into the clay to make tentacles.
• Gently push the polyp inside the toilet paper role, letting the tentacles stick out.  Bend the extending tentacles as desired.
• Use markers to color the outside of the coral.
• Explain that most coral polyps live in colonies.  To make a class colony, attach the students polyps to the inside of a shoebox in a cluster.  Place five or six inside each box.  Display the projects around the room.
• Students will then go on a scavenger hunt for facts about corals and polyps, using the Internet.  Visit these site: Reef Life/Aquarius, Sea World-Info Book, and Sea World- Coral Reefs. These are the questions that the students must find out:
• How many polyps do you think it takes to construct a large coral reef? (There may be zillions of coral animals that have added their skeletons to a reef.)
• Do polyps move from place to place?  Why or Why not? (Polyps do not move from place to place. They live in colonies, next to each other and on top of each other)
• How do polyps eat? (Coral polyps catch their food using their tentacles.)
• What is a baby polyp called? (a planula)
• What does a coral reef need to survive (clean water, warm water all year round- 68-77 degrees F or 20-25 degrees C, and sunlight- most reefs are within 50 feet or 15 m of the surface)
• Where are most of the warm shallow waters of the world found? (near the Equator)
• Locate and label on the map of the world, where you can find five coral reefs. (Great Barrier Reef, Indian Ocean, Caribbean Sea, Sea of Cortez and Hawaii)

7. Site URL of Web sites
8. Present findings to class in an oral presentation
9. Make daily entry into Ocean Journal

Vocabulary Words:

Coral Reefs
Polyps
Barrier Reef
Atolls

Assessment: 

The student will be assessed on the scavenger hunt for content and quality using Checklist. 

Homework:

The students will use word perfect or other word processing program to write a letter to the following organization with ten suggestions on how to preserve coral reefs.

Center for Marine Conservation 
1725 DeSales Street  NW, Suite 600
 Washington DC 20036  

Field Trip: Visit a local aquarium to see coral reef plants and animals in person. Take pictures of what the students saw using a digital camera.  Create a PowerPoint presentation of the childrens trip! 

Extension: Design a Coral Reef Poster

• Students will use desktop publishing to plan, design and publish coral reef posters
• Break students into groups and choose one coral reef to research: Hawaii, Sea of Cortez, Caribbean Sea, Red Sea, Indian Ocean, Great barrier Reef
• Brainstorm what should be in poster: types of plants and animals of coral reef, environmental conditions needed, name and location of coral reef, and suggestions for preservation
• Visit Coral Reefs and Coral Realm
• Collect data on index cards
• Organize data
• Create poster; add clip art and graphics from Internet
• Proofread, spell check, print
• Posters can be laminated and place around classroom