3rd Grade Resources

This lesson introduces biomimicry and connects animal adaptations to examples of technologies inspired by animal forms. Students decode the word biomimicry and learning about its relevance through assigned readings.

In this lesson, students will be asked to research animal homes from different environments. They will use their research in the final lesson of the unit to design a shelter based on animal homes that would keep them safe when exposed to severe weather.

Using biomimicry for ideas, scientists and engineers can create sustainable solutions for a vast range of problems. Scientists consider how plants and animals create a material or perform a process, and engineers then use that information to create inventions that are scalable to meet the needs of people

The purpose of this lab is to encourage students to think about the performance of a glue by investigating how changing the environment affects its adhesive properties. Students will gather data to later analyze and draw conclusions from as a class.

This lab focuses on animal adaptations by emulating the byssal threads in both the blue and ribbed mussel. Students will use yarn to simulate a byssal thread and collect data related to the strength of the yarn.

This lesson wraps up this unit (Blue Mussels: Expert Sustainable Engineers) by having the students reflect on their experiments from the previous lessons and extend their learning about connections between biomimicry and green chemistry. Students will discuss the conclusions they drew from each experiment and analyze their data from Lesson 2 as a class. They will then consider how biomimicry can ...