Classification: sorting animals

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Acknowledgements

This resource was developed by:

John Gardner, Education Officer, Zoos SA Education.

With support from the following people and organisations:

Ruth Hall, Outreach Education, DECD, (seconded to Zoos SA)

Front cover layout designed by:

Christy Martin, Access Media, Open Access College

Front cover image designed by:

Mandy Foot, Characters Pty. Ltd.

This publication is protected by copyright. It may be reproduced by South

Australian teachers for use with their students. For all other uses contact
the Zoos SA Education [email protected]

All images in the booklet are copyright of the Royal Zoological Society of
South Australia.

 2005 The Royal Zoological Society of South Australia and the

Department for Education and Child Development, South Australia
Updated April 2016

This Outreach Education program for schools is a partnership between

Zoos SA and the Department for Education and Child Development, South
Australia. Outreach Education is a team of seconded teachers based in
public institutions who are managed through the DECD Teaching and
Learning

AZES contact details

Phone: 8230 1258
Email: [email protected]
Website: zoossa.com.au/zoo-learning/
 For the Teacher
General Information
Welcome to Adelaide Zoo!

The Zoo is a great place for learning. Adelaide Zoo Education aims to support student
learning by providing resources to assist classes to have educational and enjoyable
experiences at the Zoo.

This booklet will provide a range of activities which may be undertaken by your students
during their visit to the Zoo. A map and suggested order of activities is provided to give
a logical circuit to travel during the visit.

Animal species change from time to time, and sometimes animals are “off limits” or out
of sight during visits, so a flexible approach to completion of activities is recommended.

In planning, please consider whether

 you would like your class to regroup for lunch, animal feeds, the Discovery Zone or at
the Entrance at the end of the visit. If so, relay the times and meeting places to
students or supervisors (in writing if possible.)
 you would like to see use the Nocturnal House: if so, book a time when making the
Zoo booking so your students are not disturbed by other school groups.
 you would like a Wild Zoo Day Program with a Zoo Education Officer to support your
study theme. The 45 minute interactive sessions need to be booked when you make
your class booking.

If your class is not booked in to a program involving an Education Officer, we will attempt
to meet your class at the Entrance on arrival at the Zoo. At this meeting the group will
be welcomed and given some information about the Zoo to assist their visit. General
behaviour expectations will also be outlined.

Specific information relating to this Zoo Trail will follow for the teachers and for adult
supervisors. Please ensure that supervisors have a copy of the relevant pages before
they come to the Zoo so they can also be mentally prepared to maximise the learning
for the students in their care.
 TEACHER INFORMATION
This trail is aimed at giving students an introduction to the early stages of systematic
organisation of living things – Classification. This includes,

 Placing vertebrates into appropriate Classes based on certain structural features,

 Using animals’ body covering to determine which Class they belong to,
 Focusing on the unique features of the vertebrates in each Class.

The booklet is designed for completion by groups of students. Some of the activities
require deep thinking and broad general knowledge and this is more achievable in a
group situation. Teamwork in navigation, organization and writing will also add to
students’ involvement, learning and enjoyment of the trail.

Pre-visit ideas

 Get the students to consider some of the things that are classified or sorted into
groups and sub-groups and how this helps people and makes life easier.
For example,
 Videos and DVDs in a video shop
 Belongings in your room
 Things in the school’s Resource Centre
 Items at a supermarket
 Tools, equipment, etc. in a shed
 Cutlery, crockery and kitchen utensils at home.
 Discuss the meaning and use of words like grouping, sorting and classifying, both
in general terms and for animals.
 Discuss the reasons that animals and other things are classified and the use of
scientific names.
 Research some scientific names and their meanings in English.

Post-visit ideas

Discussion/Essay/Research tasks on animal classification. Possible topics,

 Some of Australia’s Aboriginal people have very good knowledge of native

animals, their habits and their uses for food, by-products, environmental
indicators, etc. many animals are the subject of traditional stories. Discuss how
Aboriginals may have classified Australian animals.

 Research to find out more about the system of classification and how animals fit
into it. Students can select a vertebrate animal and attempt to find out its Class,
 Order, Family, Genus and Species. Students can research other animals that
belong to the same ‘Groups’.

Links to the Australian Curriculum (ACARA)

This trail is designed to be inquiry based and student focused. Its use by small groups of
students, working cooperatively, should strongly support learning processes.

SCIENCE UNDERSTANDING - Year 7

Biological Science

There are differences within and between groups of organisms. Classification helps to
organize this diversity.

Elaborations

 Reasons for classifying

 Grouping a variety of organisms on the basis of similarities and differences.
 Kingdom, Phylum, Class, Order, Family, Genus and Species.
 Scientific names.
 Using keys to identify organisms in local habitat.

Students visit a number of native and exotic species to observe and answer questions
that will provide them with information about Classification.

Students are encouraged to use their observation skills, to read signs and to talk with
Zoo staff. Supervisors should encourage students to discuss ideas and to express their
own points of view.

Key

Observe carefully

Discuss and share ideas with your group

Write down your thoughts

 A basis for Biological Classification

We could choose almost any characteristic as a basis for sorting animals. Some are
more helpful than others.
For example, consider using colour. We might group together all animals that are blue;
blue wrens, blue whales, bluebottles and blue crabs.
Or we may classify animals according to where they live, grouping together those
animals, for instance, that are found in human households; humans, dogs, budgerigars,
cockroaches, cats, mice, lice, flies, fleas – a very mixed bag!
Using an animal’s colour or where it lives as a basis for classification is not, for a
biologist, a very useful basis for a first sorting of animals because animals that are blue
may have little or nothing else in common.
People who classify animals have found that if they use structural characteristics as a
basis for classification, the animals they group together have a great deal more in
common.

Levels of Classification

As a group of organisms is being classified, each sorting stage gives us a new level in
the system of classification.
At the first level, sorting results in the kingdom level, for instance ‘animal’ kingdom or
‘plant’ kingdom. The groups that result from the second sorting make up the phylum
level, the third sorting gives us the class level and further sorting gives us the order,
family, genus and species levels in turn.
In this way most organisms are sorted into plant and animal kingdoms. Animals can then
be classified into a number of phyla and each phylum in turn may then be classified into
several classes, each class into several orders and so on. As we do this and move from
a higher to a lower level of Classification, we find the animals in groups become more
and more alike in structure.
For Example, consider the dog, Grey wolf and Red fox.

Because they have certain structural characteristics in common, they are classified in
the same group at kingdom, phylum, class, order and family levels.

However, at the genus level, the dog and the wolf have more in common than the fox
has with either, therefore the dog and the wolf are classified in one genus, Canis, and
the fox in another, Vulpes.

Then, finally each is a different species and classified as such, based on whether they
would breed together in their natural setting, rather than any structural features.

Level Dog Grey Wolf Red Fox

Kingdom Animal Animal Animal
Phylum Chordata Chordata Chordata
Class Mammalia Mammalia Mammalia
Order Carnivora Carnivora Carnivora
Family Canidae Canidae Canidae
Genus Canis Canis Vulpes
Species familiaris lupus vulpes

Reference: Biological Science-The Web of Life (Australian Academy of Science – Pt 1)

 Classification
Pre/post visit activity

When things are grouped together there must be a feature that is similar or alike.
When things are placed into separate groups there must be a difference between
them.

 Using two different coloured pencils, circle each of the transport pictures
below to place them into 2 groups and state what feature you used to put
them into each group;

The objects circled in __________ pencil are the same because ___________________

The objects circled in ________ pencil are the same because _____________________

 For each group of objects below, write one feature that they have in common;

Group 1 Group 2 Group 3

 Pre/post visit activity Classification
There are lots of examples of classification happening in everyday life using
everyday items.

 Here is a list of sports equipment:

Tennis racquet, football, discus, golf ball, soccer ball, basketball, hockey stick,
golf club, cricket bat, javelin, table tennis ball, shotput.

Classify these items into two groups using the table below;

Equipment used in a team sport Equipment used in an individual

competitor sport

 Classify the sports equipment above into three groups according to the headings
in the diagram below;
SPORTS EQUIPMENT

Used when Used when Used when

throwing kicking hitting

 Classify the sports equipment into two groups, like you did in the first activity at
the top of this page, but this time you choose the characteristic.
At the Zoo

Three of the kingdoms of living things are Plant, Animal and Fungus.
Use lines to place the following living things in the correct kingdom:

PLANT

ANIMAL

FUNGUS
 Class Level (Vertebrates)

Mammal, Bird, Reptile, Amphibian, Fish

 Observe these animals.

 Describe their appearance by using the features in the table below.
 You may complete the table by choosing some of your own animals.
CLASS
Animal Body Colour Wings, Legs, Tail Size Mammal, Bird, Fish,
Covering Flippers Reptile or Amphibian
1. Dusky
Leaf Monkey
(Map-7M)
2.
Flamingo
(Map-10M)
3.
Splendid
Tree frog
(Froggery,
Map-10B)
4.
Woma
Python
(Reptile
House, Map-
13D)
5. Murray
River rainbow
fish
(Nocturnal
House, Map-
4G)

 Which feature helped you the most when working out which Class each animal
belonged to?__________________

 All other features are not relevant for this type of grouping.
 Scientists use body coverings as one of the structural features which help to divide
the Phylum Chordates (which is mostly the Vertebrates) into the next level, which is
Class.

For each of the 5 vertebrate groups divided using body coverings, name the Class and
give one other feature, which all members of the Class possess. (This feature need not
be unique to the Class.)

Body Class name Other features of the Class

covering
Fur

Feathers

Wet Scales

Dry Scales

Wet Skin

Can you think of any vertebrate animals which are difficult to put into a Class using
body coverings as the method of classifying them? If so, give an example and
explain what the difficulty is. _________________ __

_____________________________________________ __
 Australian Wetlands Aviary
(Southern end of the Australian Rainforest)

All of the animals for this activity are in the same Kingdom – Animals, the same Phylum
– Chordata and the same Class – Birds. Just like certain features are used to sort
animals into the same group, eg all are animals, have a backbone and feathers,
there are features that we can use to separate these Birds into different
groups.

In the table below, use each feature in the left column to help you make up a
group of birds and list them in the right column.

Read the signs, use the pictures and observe the following birds!

Glossy Ibis, Red-collared Lorikeet, Plumed Whistling-duck, Royal Spoonbill, Little Pied
Cormorant, Pied Heron, Eurasian Coot and Red-tailed Black-cockatoo.

Feature/Behaviour Bird Species

Have feet for wading

Eat fish

Have a hooked beak (parrot beak)

Spend time in the water

Eat insects and/or fruit/vegetation

Have webbed feet

 Discovery Zone (Invertebrates)
(Map - P10)

Write down the names of as many animals as you could find in this area.

For each one, what do you think is one important aspect of its structure which would
help scientists to classify it?

Also, write down the name of another animal, not in the Discover Zone, which has the
same feature.

Discovery Structure used for classification Another animal

Zone with this
animal structure
 The work of Scientists benefits a lot of people!
Classifying living things takes many people a lot of time and discussion. There
must be good reasons for scientists to do it.

For each of the following people, why is it useful having animals classified?

1. A farmer who is trying to control a bug in his lucerne crop

______

2. A pet owner who is trying to provide the right food for her birds
_____

3. A gardener who wants to get rid of some weeds without using any spray
_____

Can you think of someone else who would find it useful to have an animal classified?

________