Sterling elementary students going wild over rainforest studies

STERLING – Jefferson Elementary School students have been taking a closer look at the rainforest to boost their language arts skills.

First grade students recently completed a six-week unit about animals, their habitats and their unique abilities to survive in the wild that integrates English language arts, science, research skills and more. They also made crafts, such as sloths, toucans, monkeys, trees and other flora and fauna, to transform the hallways into a multicolored construction paper rainforest.

Principal Heather Wittenauer said the first grade team enhanced the unit by focusing on the specific habitat of the tropical rainforest.

“They tied in learning about animals that live in this environment and how it applied to their Wonders Reading Unit and their ELA standards,” Wittenauer said. “Students learned so much during this unit and, as a culminating activity, were able to produce written research reports and projects focusing on one particular animal.”

First grade teacher Stacey Kested said that years ago, Jefferson students used to do a unit about the rainforest at the end of the year. She and fellow first grade teachers wanted to bring the unit back and tie it in with their current curriculum.

“We learned about the different features of the jaguar and the anaconda and the different animals that live in the rainforest,” Kested said. “Our science that we do is Mystery Science, and that unit was also about animals, and how animals survive in nature and their different traits. We tie that all together as the students learned about the habitat of the rainforest and each week was something different.”

Teacher Mikaley Smith said students spend the first week learning about how animals’ different body features help them survive in nature.

“For example, we learned about the toucan and how its beak is designed to help with its food, or how their feet grip the branches of trees and about their wings,” Smith said.

The second week is all about how animals help one another or work in teams. The third week focuses on how animals survive in nature.

“We’ll talk about the jaguars and how they run super fast, or how they can swim and climb to catch the monkeys,” Kested said. “Then, we talk about the monkeys and how they use their tail, a special feature that helps them fly through the canopy to escape. We’re also working in rich vocabulary at that time with words like predator, prey, camouflage and features.”

Week 4 explores various insects, their similarities and their differences, with the following week focusing on the many ways that humans work with animals.

The final week is spent reviewing the unit and students researching their chosen rainforest animal and writing a report with three facts about the animal that students later shared with their parents at an open house last Friday.

“A lot of them thought it was cool that they knew more about their animals than their families did,” first grade special education teacher Erica Saathoff said.

The rainforest unit started over 20 years ago with a handful of teachers participating and has since grown to include every first grade class.

“When we taught it years ago, it was truly thematic in its purpose, where we would tie in math and ELA and different standards into the theme that we chose,” Wittenauer said. “Now, it’s kind of the other way around. We’re focusing strategically on our standards and our curriculum and then utilizing ways that we can enhance the learning that we’re already doing by adding some of these opportunities for kids.”