As an optional activity, students construct decomposition observation tubes. Students observe plants on the school grounds in various stages of their life cycles. Class members listen to The Gift of the Tree by Alvin Tresselt and help draw the life cycle of a tree. Students role-play the water cycle and create an art project about the life cycle of a toad in order to identify cycles in which soil plays a part. Students perform an experiment to discover that soil can filter water.
People depend on soil.
Students observe the school's neighborhood to identify ways people use soil. Cooperative groups make adobe out of soil and construct miniature homes. They locate examples of ways people depend on soil in their neighborhoods. Students listen to Blueberries for Sal by Robert McCloskey to conclude that people and other animals depend on plants and, therefore, on soil for food. They use the clustering process to identify people involved in supplying food for other people.