[3rd4me]

I am teaching a landforms unit to my 3rd graders the first few weeks of school. I'm looking for ideas to spice it up.
They need to know the layers of the earth, 3 types of soil, volcanoes, various landforms and waterforms, hummus, and erosion.
Any ideas of good hands on activities or anything fun?
Thanks,
Lisa

[StephR]

"Magic School Bus Goes Inside the Earth" is a great book to help kick off your unit. Talks about going inside the various layers of the earth, the different types of rocks, some landforms, etc. It has a lot of information and can lead you in many different directions.

One fun little activity you can do in conjunction with volcanoes is to create little volcanos out of playdough and then erupt them. The kids love doing this and you can have discussions on the different types and the ways they erupt along the way.

And of course there is always the good old salt dough map to teach different landforms and regions.

I hope this gives you a few different ideas to get the creative juices flowing!

[iteach4th]

I, too, teach landforms to my 4th graders. Last year, instead of the regular paper/pencil quiz at the end of the unit, we used colored frosting and graham crackers! The students needed to show me and describe to me 5 different landforms that they made on their cracker out of their colored frosting. It was so much fun....the kids loved it. They were still talking about "eating the test" at the end of the year!

[IMSaved2]

I was thinking having them make a dimensional flipbook of sorts. Kinda like those books with the see-thru overlay.

You can always make a Jeopardy or Monopoly type of game, or even have them design a game to help teach the landforms, and then present it to the rest of the class.

[Ilvtching]

We had a unit in third grade for landforms also. I have a take home project I can share. I will dig out the directions on my home computer and attach them for you. I will do it today.

We had them create a landform with dough and bring it to school. Then we let them paint them. Then they created a travel brochure for their landform. It was a lot of fun. We then displayed them at conferences!

Very cool project.

Amy

[Kiki]

I always demonstrate layers of the earth by giving each child a ding dong cupcake (cut in half) and an M&M to push inside the cream part.

[Ilvtching]

Here are the directions and the recipe for the salt dough. I don't have the directions for the travel brochure...but we looked at and discussed different travel brochures...then we tri folded a piece of paper and they designed their own. I used a rubric to grade them.

If this doesn't attach correctly e-mail me at aldowverizon.net and I will e-mail it to you!

Amy

[change2R]

We used to make the landforms out of peat gravel on the playground. Toward the end of our unit I would give the kids index cards with the various names of landforms. I would break the class into groups and they had to make the landforms and label them. They alsays enjoyed this time outside.

[Nyanza]

I love your idea using graham crackers! Will you share your lesson and rubric of the activity? Any additonal information would be apprecitated.
Nyanza

[iluvpancakes]

Would you please send me that homework activity for landforms and any other hands on activities. I'm really needing help in the activity area.

Thanks