Pre-assessment: Students will be given blank board paper, crayons, and markers. They will have to draw out the food chain of an ocean animal. They must include the predator, prey, and what the prey eats all the way to the plants and plankton of the ocean.


The Objective: To find out what each student knows about the ocean. Can they make their own food chain? Can they draw the animals and plants discussed in class?

Kindergarten Ocean Food Chain (Oceans Unit)

Group 1:
The 5 students that were able to do the most and without guidance; draw a food chain, draw ocean animals and plants, discuss their food chain (although not required).

  1. Students will watch a short clip about ocean life and food chains. They will need to work as a group and write out the 10 vocabulary words they heard (this includes the animals, plants, and terms).
  1. Students will then play a flash card memory game. They will have cards with terms, animals, and plants (with pictures) on them. They will have to turn them over and try to match the pairs. They will do this as a group. Once they pair 2 cards they will read their cards to the group.
  1. Students will read about the food chain of 3 different ocean animals: an Orca, Shark, and Octopus. They will do this as a group and discuss the differences and similarities of these ocean animals.

Formative Assessments

Students will do a timed Kahoot! quiz based on what they have learned in the books and video clip. They will do this in smaller groups to work against one another. A little competition should be good for them.

The students will create a comic strip about their food chain from the pre-assessment. Here they will use their new vocabulary in proper full sentence structures with periods and capital letters. They have already learned onomatopoeia terms and can use these terms in their comic. The teacher will come around to help them with other spelling words.

Students will look at one another's work and peer edit the writing portion of the comics. They will then discuss each other's comic and ask and answer questions. This will allow for more peer to peer time. They can learn from one another and grow.

Group 2: The 12 students in this group showed me that they have some knowledge of the food chain for ocean animals. They need to be able to develop a stronger understanding of the food chain concept and the vocabulary.

  1. Students will be put into small groups of 4.
  1. Students will learn about each part of the food chain and the corresponding vocabulary one step at a time. For example: they will start with what animals in the ocean are predators? From there they will begin to build their food chains part by part. Each step will be discussed within the group and with some guidance from the teacher. Books will also be provided for the students to look at for references.

Formative Assessments

Each day the students and I will focus on different vocabulary terms. We will also focus on using these terms to describe the stages of the food chain. Each stage of the food chain will be discussed on a different day. This will help the students understand each stage more thoroughly.

  1. Students will watch the same clip as the other students to have a better understanding of the food chain. They will then discuss the clip in small groups of 4 and write down the ocean animals. They will then use the board to categorize which animals are predators and which are prey. (The walls in my classroom are just white board so each group of students can do this on their own and I can watch and look over their work).
  1. The students will then check each other's work. Each small group will go to the other group's work and check out their columns to see if they categorized their ocean animals correctly. If any changes need to be made, they will do so in green board marker. This will help the students better understand predators and prey.
  1. Once the students have created their columns I would like them to try the pre-assessment again, this time they will work in their small group of 4 to create a food chain that they must also label.

Group 3: The 5 students in this group have very limited knowledge about the food chain concept.

3 students struggled with thinking up an ocean predator despite going over the vocabulary of predators on the board. They also struggled with the idea of a food chain and what it meant.

2 students did not comprehend the assessment and instead drew out their favorite ocean animals. They did draw some ocean plants, but did not create a food chain. These students may need to be tested for special needs.

  1. Teacher and Co-Teacher will work with this group. The Co-Teacher will oversee most of their work.
  1. Students will focus on naming the ocean animals with the Co-Teacher. The teacher will use ocean animal cards to help the students see the animals and learn their names.
  1. Once animals names are learned, they will stick the animal cards under the headings predator and prey to find out where they belong. The Co-Teacher will also supervise this and assist where needed.

Formative Assessments

Kahoot! Quiz with the animal names, the terms, and other vocabulary. It will also ask questions about the food chain. For example: Is a shark a predator or prey? What do fish eat? etc.

Students will read books about the food chain of ocean animals and the different types of ocean animals and plants there are in the ocean. They will discuss with the Co-Teacher what animals they can identify in the story, what they eat, and whether they can list them as prey or predator.

Together they will build a large food chain on the board using the animal pictures and drawings if necessary. They will label their food chain with the help of the teacher if necessary. They will work on discussing how their food chain works. Who is the predator? What does it eat? What does the prey eat? What does that eat? etc.

Students will work with the Co-Teacher and the teacher.

  1. Students will practice the names of the ocean animals with flash cards. They will use the memory flash card game to help them identify the animals and how to say their names.
  1. Students will use ocean finger puppet animals to act out which animals eat what. This will help them use this play to identify predators and prey without putting too much emphasis on the terms until later. The game encourages them to participate without feeling the stress of learning new terms which may cause them to disengage.
  1. Students will go over terms like predator and prey by using a song. Predator or Prey Song
    Although this does not simply have the ocean animals it will help them understand which animals are usually predator and why.
  1. Students will read a book about the ocean food chain and discuss with the co-teacher what is happening and what is going on. The flash cards will also be used here to help the students identify the animals and vocabulary terms.

Formative Assessments

Kahoot! quiz based on the terms and ocean animals. This quiz will incorporate a lot of the animal pictures. They will need to identify which animal is predator and which is prey.

The students will have a fill in the blanks food chain assessment to do. They will have the animals on the food chain and plants. They will have to fill in the names of the animals and plants. There will be a vocabulary list provided as well as images to help them along.