Hello everyone and welcome to our Education Resources page!
Our Tilgate Bites education programme will keep children of all ages entertained and learning all about nature! We’ve done our best to cover various topics including Adaptations, Classification, Minibeasts and more through many different activities, including plenty designed to practice their skills and learning from other subjects! These resources have been designed to meet national curriculum learning objectives. Find all resources here and all our videos on our Education Facebook Page or on our YouTube Channel.
All our activities are listed below. Alternatively:
…You can browse our activities arranged by topic with full national curriculum objectives here!
…Or you can look at our activities arranged by classroom subject here!
…Or you can browse activities by age here!
We hope you enjoy them! If your children (or you!) have any questions, feel free to post a comment or send us a message on our Facebook page; we’re happy to help and would love to keep in touch with the budding zoologists out there!
Feel free to send us any work you complete! At the end of each topic, learners will receive a certificate acknowledging their achievement, but we’d like to know what you each achieved; so let us know!
__________________________________________________________________________________________
Topic 1 – Adaptations and Habitats
How are animals suited to their environment? What features help them to survive? How do they find food and escape predators? The videos for this topic can be found on our Education Facebook page or here. This topic is accessible to most key stages but is specifically designed to cover KS1/Year 2 learning on ‘Living Things and Their Habitats’. Curriculum points from KS2 will be touched upon in the latter part of the topic.
Activity 1 Harvest Mouse Adaptations
Activity 2 Create Your Own Grassland Habitat
Activity 3 Brilliant Barn Owls
Activity 6 Desert Cultures Research
Activity 7 Climate Change Experiment
Activity 8 Draw Your Own Habitat
Phonics Reading and Writing ‘ow’ Phoneme
Micro-Habitats at Tilgate Bug Hotel!
Build Your Own Mini Bug Hotel!
Adaptations and Habitats Quiz Answers
Adaptations and Habitats Topic Certificate
__________________________________________________________________________________________
Topic 2 – Classification
There is a huge variety of creatures on Earth! How can we make sense of them all? We look at the features we use to sort them into groups, firstly into vertebrates and invertebrates, then into fish, amphibians, reptiles, birds and mammals. The videos for this topic can be found on our Education Facebook page or here. This topic is accessible to most key stages but is specifically designed to cover KS1/Year 1 learning on ‘Animals including humans’ and KS2/Year 4 and Year 6 learning on ‘Living Things and Their Habitats’.
Activity 4 Make Your Own Snake Scales!
Activity 5 Create Your Own Bird Song!
Activity 7 Design Your Own Animal!
Phonics Spelling Split Digraphs
Classification Topic Certificate
_______________________________________________________________________________________
Topic 3 – Minibeasts
What tiny creatures are hiding right under noses? We’ll look at some of the main types of minibeasts including molluscs and arachnids as well as insects. A fun bug hunt will get learners observing and presenting data like proper scientists and games and art will reinforce specific learning points. The videos for this topic can be found on our Education Facebook page or here. The second part of the topic is a self contained puzzle: there has been a murder! Can you be a detective and work out who killed the cockroach?
This topic is accessible to most key stages but is specifically designed to cover KS1/Year 2 on ‘Animals including humans’ and KS2/Year 4, 5 and 6 learning on ‘Living Things and Their Habitats’. The second part of the topic is aimed more strictly at KS2 and includes ‘working scientifically‘ objectives.
Part 1: Magnificent Minibeasts
Activity 3 Minibeasts Lifecycles
Part 2: Minibeasts and Murder!
Activity 1 Design Your Own Wanted Poster
Activity 3 Recreate the Crime Scene!
__________________________________________________________________________________________
Topic 4 – Conservation
What threats face wildlife? How can people help to ensure that animals do not become endangered or extinct? We will look at a selection of threats to wildlife and to the environment, looking at which species are affected and what can be done to help them. The videos for this topic can be found on our Education Facebook page or here. This topic is accessible to most key stages but is specifically designed to cover KS2/Year 4 learning on ‘Living Things and Their Habitats’.
Activity 3 Create a storyboard for a sustainable palm oil advert
Phonics Reading and Writing ‘or’ Phoneme
__________________________________________________________________________________________
Topic 5 – Reproduction and Life Cycles
Animal babies are adorable, but they don’t stay babies forever! What is a life cycle? How do animals start life and change as they get older? We will cover an overview of what a life cycle is, including reproduction, child-rearing and aging, focusing on amphibians, birds and mammals. The video for this topic can be found on our Education Facebook page or here. This topic is accessible to most key stages but is specifically designed to cover KS1/Year 2 learning on ‘Animals, including Humans’ and KS2/Year 5 learning on ‘Animals, including Humans’.
Activity 1 Gestation and Growth
Reproduction and Life Cycles Certificate
Reproduction & Life Cycles Quiz
Reproduction & Life Cycles Answers
_________________________________________________________________________________________
Topic 6 – Evolution
What is ‘evolution’ and how does it work? Who discovered it and what evidence is there to support it? In this topic, we travel through the Victorian era tracking early discoveries and observations with Mary Anning, Charles Darwin and Alfred Russel Wallace’s. We see evolution and speciation in our science activities, as well as literacy skills practice in the form of letter writing and links well with history. The videos for this topic can be found on our Education Facebook page or here. This topic has primarily been designed to cover upper KS2/Year 6 learning on ‘Evolution and inheritance’. How natural selection acts as a mechanism for evolution is also a key part of KS3 and KS4 biology.
Activity 1 Discovering Dinosaurs
Activity 3 Darwin’s Observations – Variation
Activity 4 The Survivors Awards!
Activity 8 Learning from our Forebears
__________________________________________________________________________________________
Topic 7 – Diets and Food Chains
The various diets of animals and how the relationships between predators and prey is a key component of primary school biology. This topic looks at herbivores, carnivores and omnivores, simple food chains and the different types of teeth found in mammals. The videos for this topic can be found on our Education Facebook page or here. This topic covers KS1 and KS2 objectives including KS1/Year 1 ‘Animals, including Humans’ and Year 2 ‘Living things and their habitats, Year 3 and 4 ‘Animals, including humans’ objectives.
Activity 2 Crunching Carnivores
Activity 3 All You Can Eat Omnivores
Phonics Creative Writing ‘ee’ and ‘ou’ Phonemes
Squirrels, Mice and All Things Nice!
__________________________________________________________________________________________
Topic 8 – Anatomy
This topic looks at animals and humans to help learners to understand key systems in human bodies. Our activities begin with a focus on skeletons, bones and muscles as protection and support for the body and then develops to look at organs, specifically the heart and lungs. Alongside science activities, we discuss movement and exercise through drama and PE activities (the PE activity can be found using the video link). The videos for this topic can be found on our Education Facebook page or here.
Activity 2 – Bare Bones Puzzle
Activity 3 – Ye Olde Natural History Illustration
Activity 5 – Animal Attitude Acting
Activity 7 – Body Language Acting
Activity 8 – Know Your Own Heart
Activity 9 – At the Top with Your Lungs
Activity 10 – Ribbit Ribbit Rhymes!
__________________________________________________________________________________________
Topic 9 – End of Term Fun Week!
Just for fun, we have also created some fun activities to finish on, or to fill those little gaps in the day! We hope you enjoy!
Family and Friends Quiz – What’s In A Name?
Tilgate Nature Centre Word Search
__________________________________________________________________________________________
Christmas Resources!
Merry Christmas! Please enjoy a few fun activities to get you and yours in a festive mood!
__________________________________________________________________________________________
Live Talk Resources – Fun activities inspired by our live FB talks
Can You See Me – Spot the insects!
Squirrels, Mice and All Things Nice!
A Little Help from your Friends
__________________________________________________________________________________________
Equality and Equity and Diversity Resources
Black Science Heroes John Edmonstone
Black Science Heroes Neil De Grasse Tyson
Black Science Heroes Paula Kahumbu
Black Science Heroes Percy Lavon Julian
Black Science Heroes Charles Henry Turner
Black Science Heroes Wordsearch
__________________________________________________________________________________________
Nursery resources – Activities for little ones
__________________________________________________________________________________________
Please complete this very short evaluation form to help us improve our educational content!
Tilgate Nature Centre 