Woodlouse House

Find out the features that identify a woodlouse. Go on a bug hunt. Make a woodlouse house out of scavenged forest floor finds.

FREE

Children work cooperatively and with consideration in the making activities. Children talk about the physical features of a woodlouse in age appropriate language. Problem-solving in constructing the woodlouse house.

Laminated sheets illustrating woodlouse. Trilobite fossils. Containers for catching bugs and device for catching bugs (although fingers are fine).

  1. Safety Basic & Practice. Walk round the Forest School area. What are the hazards? What must we do to stay safe?
  2. Intro. Where might we find woodlice? Look at woodlouse picture – what kind of a creature is it (Crustacean)? They eat decaying wood and plant matter. They like damp conditions. They are food for birds, centipedes, spiders and even toads. Use trilobite fossils to show ancestry.

3.Hunt for wood lice in twos. Catch wood lice only in viewing containers.

 – How many woodlice did we catch? Can you count them?

 – Where do woodlice love to hide?

 – How many legs have you got? How many legs has a wood louse? (14)

 – What shape does a woodlouse make if you touch it? (a ball)

  1. Make a woodlouse house. What makes a woodlouse happy? (dark, moist – but not wet, rotting plant matter, tree bark, pieces of rotting wood, safe from predators, somewhere a bit out of the way. Make a woodlouse house with found materials.

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