Section 1

Activity: Native or Non-Native?
Plant Scavenger Hunt

Overview

Students will sort through images of weeds and native plants. Students then group the images by similar features and characteristics. This activity can also be done outside, allowing the opportunity for a scavenger hunt of native and non-native plants using the "RON Scavenger Hunt Cards".

Grade level: 1-4

Focus: Life Science, Investigation, Experimentation, Ecology

Objectives

1. Students will sort and compare native and non-native plants using at least three different criteria
2. Students will be able to define the term ecosystem.
3. Students will learn to recognize at least four different plants from their surrounding ecosystems.
4. Students will brainstorm four characteristics of a "weedy" species.

Site: Classroom & Outdoors

Time Format:  1 class meetings (1-1.5 hours)

Materials

· Download the RON Scavenger Hunt Cards & RON Scavenger Hunt Checklist.

Note to MAC users: Accessing the Scavenger Hunt cards & Checklist via the link above may not load properly. View these files by opening the file called pdf on the CD and open the document toc.pdf.
This will allow you to access the printable version of these materials. You must have Acrobat Reader to access the print version of these files.

· Rubber bands of various lengths, widths, and colors.
· Journal
 

Advanced Preparation

1. Return to the "weedy" location close to your classroom or meeting place containing some of the native plants and noxious weeds mentioned in the "RON Scavenger Hunt Cards".

2. Use the "RON Scavenger Hunt Cards" to become familiar with some local native plants and invasive weeds in your area. 
3.  Make copies of the ÎPlant Scavenger Hunt Observationâ & ÎPlant Scavenger Hunt Check Listâ. 

Activity

1. Divide the class into groups of 3-4 students and distribute rubber bands in a variety lengths, widths, and colors.

2. Ask students to look at the rubber bands and, as a group, have them brainstorm how the rubber bands are similar to and different from each other. Then bring the 
class together to list on the board the different ways the rubber bands are alike and different. Give the students about 2-3 minutes to do this.  

Teacher Help: Grouping possibilities would be: color, length, thickness, elasticity etc..

3.  Tell the students that scientists use these similarities and differences to classify the natural world around them. The tool that they use is called an identification key. From an identification key, one can unlock the secrets of an object/plant/animal, which have been included in the key. Ask students: What are some secrets that we can find out about an object/plant/animal?
 

4.  Teacher Help:  (Names, diet, preferred habitat, etc.) 
Tell students that today we have some keys to unlock some secrets about plants in our local area. Explain to students that the area around us is called an ecosystem.  Teacher Help:  Depending on your location define the ecosystem.  (I.e. Oak Grassland, Chaparral, Riparian)
Explain to students that an ecosystem is a community of plants and animals that depend on each other to survive.  Explain to students that today we will learn a little more about the animals and plants that live in this ecosystem.
 
 

5. Distribute the "RON Scavenger Hunt Cards" to the class groups. Tell the students that the cards contain an image and information about native and non-native invasive "weedy" plants. The plants that are "weedy" have the "weedy" logo on them. Ask students to organize the plants into weeds and natives. Give them 2 minutes to do this. Now ask the groups to organize the plants by features. (Color, leaf size, thorns, flowers, etc.) Ask the groups to explain how they reorganized the plants. 

Ask students: Do the weeds look a lot like natives? 
Teacher Help: There is not one answer for students. Have them discuss what some of the similarities and differences are between weeds and native plants.
What are some of the names given to these plants?

Now ask the students to organize the cards by another feature that they did not do the previous time.

6. If time and location allow spend the rest of the session as a scavenger hunt for weeds and natives in your area. Use the cards as 'keys' to unlocking the secrets of plants in your area. Another option is to photocopy the information on the "RON Scavenger Hunt Cards" and tie them to the native and non-native plants in your area. This can form a temporary interpretive garden.
 
 

7. Work with students to come up with questions from their observations regarding the plants in the school yard. 

Teacher Help: "Are the plants on the school yard native or invasive?  

How do you tell a native from an exotic weed plant?

8. Brainstorm with the students their ideas of  'weed" characteristics.

Teacher Help:  Invasive plant experts have found that invasive plants frequently:

· Produce many seeds
· Monopolize nutrients or water
· Germinate quicker and grow faster than natives
· Avoid predation from herbivores (ie have hairy leaves, spines, bad taste)
 

Wrap-up

1. Have students list at least three different ways of sorting and comparing the plants they explored today.

2. Have students list and discuss/write about at least four different plants from their surrounding community.
 

3. Have students list the four characteristics of a "weedy" species.
 

Going Further
Tell students that scientists use keys to identify a variety of species. Scientists who design keys are called Taxonomists. When a taxonomist designs a key it will only identify objects that are contained in that particular key.

Ask students: How might this be a problem? 
Ask students: Could it be bad to have too many keys? Why? Ask students: How do you decide what will go into a key and how many to have