Authentic Performance Activities facilitate a student’s understanding of a lesson’s usefulness in real life. They are also an Understanding by Design (UbD) assessment tool. Focus questions act as pre- and post-assessment indicators of the activity’s effectiveness.
Focus Questions:
1. Why do we learn about animal populations?
2. Can you think of any other jobs where knowing about animal populations might be helpful?
3. Can you think of any ways where knowing about animal populations could affect your home and property (orchards, flower gardens, etc.)?
Birds populations around the world are dropping, especially in birds that migrate. As a migratory bird specialist, it is your job to come up with a plan to slow their decline.
Do some research and come up with some suggestions that can be developed into a national ad campaign to help save wild birds.
Fulfillment of Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS)
ESS3.C: Human Impacts on Earth Systems
• Human activities have significantly altered the biosphere, sometimes damaging or destroying natural habitats and causing the extinction of other species. But changes to Earth’s environments can have different impacts (negative and positive) for different living things. (MS-ESS3-3)
Performance Expectations – Students who demonstrate understanding can:
MS-ESS3-3. Apply scientific principles to design a method for monitoring and minimizing a human impact on the environment. [Clarification Statement: Examples of the design process include examining human environmental impacts, assessing the kinds of solutions that are feasible, and designing and evaluating solutions that could reduce that impact. Examples of human impacts can include water usage (such as the withdrawal of water from streams and aquifers or the construction of dams and levees), land usage (such as urban development, agriculture, or the removal of wetlands), and pollution (such as of the air, water, or land).]