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Category: Bugs Collecting and studying insects is a great way to get outside and explore your schoolyard or local natural area because insects live anywhere there are trees, shrubs, or grass. Insect collection can be a meaningful way to engage students in an inquiry project and there are endless ways to extend your collection activity into writing, art, adaptation studies, and ecology. This kit provides everything you need to go on an exciting, hands-on, insect collecting adventure with your students. CHECK OUT: Kits may be checked out for two weeks and are available at our Portland office. In

The Animal Tracks kit has materials for students to learn about track patterns and gaits, make their own tracks, and develop skills to identify tracks in the wild.

The Water Quality Sampling kit contains basic equipment to test physical and chemical properties of your local waterway.

The Animal Signs and Observations kit contains a variety of exciting animal artifacts such as pelts and skulls.

The Explore Birds kit provides materials to support and enrich a unit on birds.

The Beaver Adaptation kit contains materials for students to rotate through hands-on stations while exploring beaver artifacts and learning how beavers thrive in their habitat. Supplies include: 1. Beaver skull and pelt 2. Chewed sticks, laminated pictures of scat, rubber track molds, beaver track stencils, track stamps 3. Beaver dress-up kit (3 sets): items that resemble adaptations 4. The Beaver Pond by Alvin Tresselt 5. Coloring sheets NGSS Connections: K-LS1-1. Use observations to describe patterns of what plants and animals (including humans) need to survive. 2-LS4-1. Make observations of

The Food Web Jenga Kit is a fun and tactile way to illustrate how natural and human actions affect food chains. NGSS Connections: 5-LS2-1. Develop a model to describe the movement of matter among plants, animals, decomposers, and the environment. 5-PS3-1. Use models to describe that energy in animals’ food (used for body repair, growth, motion, and to maintain body warmth) was once energy from the sun. 5-ESS3-1. Obtain and combine information about ways individual communities use science ideas to protect the Earth’s resources and environment. CHECK OUT: Kits may be checked out for two weeks

The Water Cycle Kit teachers students about the intricacies of the water cycle and asks then to become part of the movement of water. NGSS connections: 2-ESS2-3. Water is found in the ocean, rivers, lakes, and ponds, Water exists as solid ice and liquid form. 4-ESS2-1. Rainfall helps to shape the land and affects the types of living things found in a region. 5-ESS2-1. Earth’s major systems are the geosphere (solid and molten rock, soil, and sediments), the hydrosphere (water and ice), the atmosphere (air), and the biosphere (living things, including humans). These systems interact in multiple