IPS/Butler University Laboratory School

Yesterday, we took some to connect our current project with this week’s readers workshop study on perspective.

At the end of the day, after packing up, we all met together on the big rug to read a book about a shark’s food chain. We have read a couple books about food chain’s in general, but this was our first time looking specifically at the food chain of a shark. The book was excellent because it started with plankton, all the way at the very bottom of the food chain and then moved up, all the way to the top with the great white shark! We talked about plankton, mussels, lobsters, octopi, sea lion, and then sharks.

In the book, it stated that the great white shark doesn’t have any real predators that try to eat it. However, one of our students shared that, in some countries, people cut off the fins of sharks. After hearing this, we took some time to consider what a person’s perspective usually is when thinking of sharks. Then we took some time to consider what a shark’s perspective might be of humans, now knowing that some humans are predators of sharks. It was interesting to see the kids take some time to think about the fact that, these huge “dangerous” animals who are often times viewed as scary by humans, might actually be afraid of us.

One of our students has suggested that we build a large food chain of a shark to show other people in our school what a shark eats. My goal is that this study of a sharks food chain will lead to a greater understanding of how one animal impacts other animals and its ecosystem. Eventually, my dream would be for that understanding to transfer over to how each individual in OUR ecosystem (our school/classroom) impacts others!

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