Whereas a northern forest has an average of 25 species of trees/acre, the rain forest has hundreds of species of trees/acre. Trees in the rain forest grow much taller on average than the trees in the temperate forest (however the oldest, largest and tallest trees in the world are temperate forest trees such as redwoods and sequoias.) The earth in rain forests is much more shallow and less nutritious than that in temperate forests. Rainforest are are acclimated to hotter temperatures.īecause rain forests grow at a faster rate and all year round, they produce more oxygen than northern forests. The understory of the rain forest needs much less sunlight than northern forests. Deciduous forests are dormant in the winter except for evergreens.

Rain forest plants are green and growing year-round. How is a rain forest different from woodlot in your schoolyard? Leaves in both forests are eaten by a variety of insects and have mechanisms to protect themselves from herbivorie.īoth are home to many species of animals.Ģ. How is a rain forest similar to the forest near your schoolyard?īoth use photosynthesis to turn sunlight into energy.īoth need air, water and earth in order to live. How Are the Tropical and Temperate Forests Similar and Different?ġ. If there is even one tree, one blade of grass or one weed poking up through a crack in the playground, you can use it for these lessons. The most important thing teachers can do is to bring children outside, introduce them to the wonders of nature and help to connect them to the natural world. Children need open space to spend unstructured time in, to explore and to connect with the natural world.Ĭhildren can help save land in their own communities. The forests and natural areas in our own back yards are in need of saving, too.They, too, are habitat for many living things.

I am writing this curriculum to try to remedy this. But what I have found, in traveling around the country and speaking at schools and conferences, is that often teaching about the rain forest precludes hands-on teaching about living breathing ecosystems with actual forays out into the real world of nature.

Introduction: I wrote The Great Kapok Tree so that children would know about the threat to the world’s rain forests and, hopefully, try to save them.Ĭhildren have raised thousands of dollars to protect rain forest, especially the Monteverde rain forest in Costa Rica.

For use with The Great Kapok Tree, The Shaman’s Apprentice and Flute’s Journey

The great kapok tree amazon