Explorify at home: Habitats

Explorify at home is a special series of science activities for parents and carers of primary school children who are now learning at home. We define activities by age and curriculum topics in Explorify, but these collections are also suitable to do all together as a family of mixed aged children. Or if your little scientist just wants to explore further, pick something from the other age sections for inspiration! Teachers can find out about our full (free!) classroom resource at the bottom of this page.

Parents, read on!

This collection is all about habitats. While schools are closed and access to a wide range of habitats is not really possible, being able to wonder at far off views is really important. The activities we’ve selected here help you to look at lots of different habitats. Watch together and look closely – describe the different habitats you can see and look at how different living things interact within their habitat. If you want to watch these videos in full screen, click the arrows on the right of the play bar.

For children aged 5-7

First, watch this video: 'In the swim' shows lots of different marine life. Encourage your children to think about the different fish they see and talk about:

• How do these animals move through the water?
• Why are they coloured or patterned differently?
• Why do some fish live in shoals and others live alone?

Now watch this habitat change! Habitats change over time and in one year, a habitat responds to seasonal changes. Watch the season changes in this video below. It is a time-lapse sequence showing one woodland area changing in a year but speeded up a bit.

Hands-on activity:

Make a picture diary (or take photographs if you can) to show the changing view in a garden or from your window on a weekly basis?

Watch more on Habitats and food chains on: BBC Bitesize Daily

Age 7-9/

First, watch this video: Ever wondered why animals run? Most animals are running to find food or to escape from predators. Some run on four legs, some on two. Watch a variety of animals running in this video "To flee or not to flee". Look carefully to see how they run and to work out where their habitat is. Can you work out why they are running?

Hands-on activity: Try different ways of running. Can you run with your hands by your side?

Watch more on Habitats and food chains on: BBC Bitesize Daily

Age 9-11

First, take a close-up look at this image: Some creatures exist in the harshest of habitats, adapted to survive and thrive where there may be little water, very low or very high temperatures, and may need to find novel ways to survive by slowing their metabolism.

During winter, insects become dormant and need to find somewhere safe to shelter that will protect them from cold and from drying out too.

Hands-on activity: Make a bug hotel using a range of materials to provide some places for insects to shelter. Ther is more information on creating a bug hotel on the BBC website.

Watch more on Habitats and animal life-cycles on: BBC Bitesize Daily

That's all for this week!

We hope your little scientists have enjoyed exploring habitats this week. We'd love to know how you got on. You can follow us on Twitter or Facebook or email us if you have any feedback on this collection.

Please note that adults should supervise practical activities, make sure that children use appropriate materials and tools, and wash hands after handling any food items.

Take it further:

- Visit STEM Learning, to explore their support for parents and carers with home learning.

- Watch the BBC Bitesize Daily programmes on Habitats which are now available (from 20th May 2020), linked above under your child's age. Previous programmes including versions for Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland can be found on the iPlayer.

- Browse our other collections – there's are more added each week!

Are you a primary school teacher who has yet to sign up to Explorify?

If you are a teacher who hasn't discovered Explorify before, you can sign up and explore the whole website with over 400 free activities. (It's free, as it's funded by charitable foundation Wellcome Trust. Our mission is to help you enhance your science teaching and get your pupils thinking like scientists!) We provide background science, to help you field questions from your pupils and ideas to take our curriculum-linked activities further. Something to get your teeth into for when you're back in the classroom!

Image credits:

‘In the swim: Clips via Shutterstock; Music: Yu-City Kamata by Dan Bodan via YouTube Audio Library CC0;

'Seasonal changes': Eirik Solheim via Vimeo CC0

‘To flee or not to flee’: Video: Pangolin © Natural History Media, all rights reserved. All others via Shutterstock; Music: Hillbilly Hologram by The Whole Other via YouTube Audio Library CC0

'Bee in wooden insect hotel': Christoph Hetzmannseder via Getty Images RF