"Owl" About Science

Yeah, yeah...wordplay.  Anyway, next week, my class is dissecting owl pellets and studying owls to start our unit on food webs.  This lesson is one of my faves!

I ordered owl pellets from our Region's office--and they sent me one per every 2 students. Woohoo!  These are synthetic due to a shortage, but they look more realistic than some of the synthetic ones I've seen.  With the synthetic, there's a "skeleton" of moles, rodents, or birds inside each one.

Picture of the pellets

UPDATE: Here's the pics!

My Owl Unit focuses on life cycles of owls, adaptations, and food chains.  We are using the food chains part to introduce the concept before moving on to food webs.

Here's my suggestions for using this pack:

1. Show students the owl pellet and discuss where it comes from.  There are great YouTube clips online to show students of owls coughing up pellets.

2. Dissect the owl pellets using the suggestions in my pack.  Have students complete the worksheet guides included where they discover what their owl ate and graph their data.

3. Introduce food chains vocabulary to students and have students complete the vocabulary chart in the pack with a definition and drawing for each term.
4. Use the food chain cards to create a food chain for the owl.  Add the labels to identify correct vocab.
5. Use the students' data from their owl pellet dissection to start a food web drawing.  Fill in the food web with other animals that would be found in the ecosystem.
6. Use the web to create scenarios and determine what the effect would be on different organisms (e.g. if there was a drought and the plants began to perish).

Check out the Owls Pack in my TpT Store.

TEKS Addressed:
3.9B identify and describe the flow of energy in a food chain and predict how changes in a food chain affect the ecosystem such as removal of frogs from a pond or bees from a field
4.9B describe the flow of energy through food webs, beginning with the Sun, and predict how changes in the ecosystem affect the food web such as a fire in a forest.
Review before beginning 5.9B describe how the flow of energy derived from the Sun, used by producers to create their own food, is transferred through a food chain and food web to consumers and decomposer