Whales

Objectives:

• Students will be able to describe the physical characteristics of whales.

• Students will be able to identify the behavioral characteristics of whales.

• Students will be able to distinguish among different types of whales.

Suggested Grades:

3rd Grade - 4th Grade - 5th Grade

Lesson Procedure:

Print the reading comprehension worksheet passage and questions (see below).

Students should read the passage silently, then answer the questions. Teachers may also use the text as part of a classroom lesson plan.

Lesson Excerpt:

While whales may look a lot like very large fish, they are not fish. Whales are mammals, just like humans, cats and lions! This means they have lungs for breathing and they feed their young milk. If you look at a whale's tail, you will see that it is horizontal, not vertical like a fish's tail. A whale's tail has two flaps called flukes. Whales move their tails up and down to get power so they can swim through the ocean. Whales also use their tails to leap out of the ocean. This is call breaching. When whales breach, they almost appear to be flying out of the water. This is done as a signal to other whales.

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