Enemies and Threats to Sea Horses

Objectives

The students identify enemies/threats to sea horses.

Time Required

2- 45 minute periods

Vocabulary

hatchling - baby sea horse
Hippocampus- scientific name for sea horse group of animals
enemy- anything that harms
threat- to be a possible danger to

Materials

Computer with an Internet connection
Paper, pencils, crayons

Procedure

1. The teacher will review the information the students have researched about sea horses. List seahorse facts on blackboard/whiteboard.
2. The students will be asked to find threats and enemies of the sea horses. Examples: The combination of direct catch, incidental catch in trawl nets (by catch), and habitat destruction has placed seahorse populations at risk.
3. The students can research sea horse threats and enemies at Project Sea Horse by clicking on the sea horse trade.
4. The students will then write a paragraph about the threats and enemies to sea horses.

Evaluation

The teacher will evaluate the sea horse paragraph using a rubric from Rubistar.  The teacher goes to Research and Writing section and clicks on Story Writing to create grading rubric. The rubric can also be taken from local state/county writing rubrics.

The teacher will review the K-W-L chart for any additional information the students have added.

Home Learning

Students will create a habitat for a sea horse. It should include a fact card which has the name of a sea horse, its habitat, eating habits, color, size and enemies.  A shoe box diorama would be the ideal size.

Extension Activity

The students will be asked to provide additional web sites to explore and/or titles of books to add to the classroom research library.