Lesson 2 -- Protecting the Critical Habitat of the Manatee and the Loggerhead Turtle
First Grade
Maya Mountain Marine Corridor, Belize
Concept
Regardless of the natural surroundings or the day-to-day conditions in any given place, plants and animals rely on their environment to provide them with the raw materials they need for life and the conditions to live safely and without stress. To protect manatees and loggerheads, we need to protect their homes.
Essential Question
What do manatees and loggerhead turtles have in common with you and your neighborhood?
 Step 1 -- Connect (The Concept to Prior Knowledge)
Challenge
Students will identify the characteristics of the manatee and the loggerhead turtle and give evidence of similarities and differences between these species and humans. Students will describe the kinds of homes (and play spaces) each species needs to survive (example: manatee needs clean and deep water).
Materials
- Maps of schoolyard from Lesson 1, Step 1
- Species profiles
- Story: Manny the Manatee and the Mystery of the Murky Water, an original Rainforest Alliance story
- Map that includes coastal ecosystem of Belize
Procedure
- Students will identify places where they feel most comfortable, safe and healthy on the map of their schoolyard/playspace.
- Students are acquainted with the manatee and the loggerhead turtle using the species profiles from the Rainforest Alliance.
- Students will be acquainted with a map of the coastal ecosystem of Belize and the river system discussed in Manny the Manatee and the Mystery of the Murky Water, a Rainforest Alliance story.
- Discuss with students what is different in this landscape as compared to their own neighborhoods.
Step 2 -- Literature/Discuss (Give Expert Information Book; Ask Questions)
Challenge
Students learn about the Belize environment through a story and hear about changes in land practices that may threaten the comfort, safety and health like those that are faced by the manatee and loggerhead turtle in Belize.
Step 3A -- Practice (Math and Learning Centers)
Challenge
Students understand the landscape that Manny lives in by looking at maps that scale sequentially closer to the coastal ecosystem from a map that includes North America.
Materials
- Maps of the world, Central America and Belize
Procedure
- Place the sequentially scaled maps on the floor in a random order and have
students order them so that they begin to focus on the coastal Belize area.
- The last map in the sequence should be one that contains Manny's home.
Step 3B -- Create (Performance Tasks Related to Standard Indicators)
Challenge
Students will create a map similar to their schoolyard map that represents the area where the manatee and loggerhead turtles live.
Materials
- Paper, pencils
Procedure
On another roughly outlined map, students draw their conception of the place where the manatee and loggerhead live, based on what they know about the animals from different resources like the slideshow, book and species profile.
Step 4 -- Present (Edit Work/Students Present Projects)
Challenge
To connect their own sense of place with the place where the manatee and turtle live.
Materials
- Map of Belize from Step 3B
Procedure
Students will describe to others what they think the manatee and the loggerhead need to be comfortable, healthy and safe. They will use the Belize map they have created as reference.
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