Description

Overview: This activity introduces a suite of organisms that live in forests of northern Rocky Mountains and North Cascades. It features species representative of 3 forest communities: those dominated by ponderosa pine, lodgepole pine, and whitebark pine . Each student “adopts” an organism, learns about its characteristics and its relationship to fire, and gives a presentation on it to the class - illustrated by some form of art work.

Goal:Increase students’ understanding of ecological communities, ecosystems, and biodiversity by learning about some of the plants, animals, and fungi that live in forests of northern Rocky Mountains and North Cascades.

Objective: Given reference materials from the FireWorks Encyclopedia:

• Students can prepare a mask, costume, puppet, or other art work and use it in a 3- to 4-minute presentation that describes the biology of their organism and its relationship to fire.
• Students can understand that individual species have specific ways to survive the fires that were historically typical in the ecosystems where they live.