Learn about Wildlife at Home or at School
For more than 35 years the Alaska Department of Fish and Game has worked to support educators teaching about Alaska's wildlife and habitat. Now, more than ever, engagement in the outdoors with easy-to-use, place-based lessons and materials will help your students connect with their place, families, and the natural world.
**For even more amazing teaching resources, click on the Teacher Resources page!
Contact: Brenda Duty, Alaska Wildlife Curriculum Coordinator brenda.duty@alaska.gov
Tracks and Animal Signs
Check out the different ways you can learn about animal signs!
Alaska Ecology Cards (PDF 2,881 kB)
Alaska's Wild Wonders Kids Magazine: Tracks! (PDF 1,359 kB)
Track Card Download (PDF 490 kB)
Track Puzzles for early childhood (PDF 163 kB)
Track Tuesday
The Alaska Department of Fish and Game's Facebook page features weekly-Track Tuesday posts- includes tracking tips, photos and videos
The Alaska Department of Fish and Game's Facebook page features weekly-Track Tuesday posts- includes tracking tips, photos and videos
Early Childhood Tracking Data (PDF 51 kB)
Furs
Learn about the amazing similarities and differences of the fur on Alaska's
Animals with these resources.
How to videos
Learn how to take pictures of animal tracks so you can document them or seek help with identification.
Students and teachers learn from observing nature in the Mat-Su Valley.
Join Wildlife Education Specialist, Mike Taras in Fairbanks and learn how to tell a story from the tracks animals leave behind.
Activities for Home or School
Lessons for a changing Season
Even if your community is still covered in snow, changes are happening! Check out how trees and shrubs
respond to more light and heat.
Forests and Wildlife Full Curriculum Guide (PDF 10,468 kB)
Snag a home! (PDF 123 kB)
Forests and Sunlight (PDF 115 kB)
Forests and Air (PDF 126 kB)
Forest Succession Background (PDF 817 kB)
Succession Activity: Which animal goes where? (PDF 410 kB)
Rain-Making Partners (PDF 145 kB)
Tree Basics: Elements that Create a Forest (PDF 1,245 kB)
Trees Worksheets (PDF 95 kB)
Tree Twig Growth Rate (PDF 93 kB)
Tree Seed Game (PDF 122 kB)
Bears
Learn more about Alaska's Bears Teaching Guide with worksheets, activities and background information
Bear Blitz! (PDF 355 kB)
Wildlife Safety Materials
Use these presentations and materials to help students and
their adults learn more about wildlife safety
Scavenger Hunts
Grow your observation skills with a little hunt and find. Using a camera to
photograph your finds to create a digital journal to introduce technology.
Revisit the sites to see what has changed!
Inquiry Challenges
Challenge Intro Video
Join Mike Taras to learn about some interesting beaver behavior.
Use the resources listed here to see if you can figure out what is happening!
Wildlife Notebook: Beavers (PDF 38 kB)
Beaver, Muskrat, Otter Finger Puppets (PDF 163 kB)
Returning and Emerging Wildlife
Birds are back
The Alaska State Refuges are special places where migrating
birds nest or just stop over. Here are a few guides for adults or students to learn more.
Palmer Hay Flats - My Bird Journal(Mat-Su Valley) (PDF 864 kB)
Potter Marsh (Anchorage) (PDF 387 kB)
Bird Watch-Creamer's Field (Fairbanks) (PDF 616 kB)
Booklet: Creamer's Field Guide to Birds (PDF 674 kB)
Learn more about common birds in Alaska (PDF 2,161 kB)
Wood Frogs
This time of year wood frogs are croaking their song all
over Alaska. They can be found even in the busiest places
in Alaska. Test your wood frog knowledge by their 'song,'
learn about their life cycle and their amazing winter survival adaptation.
All about wood frogs (PDF 51 kB)
What does one wood frog sound like? (MP3 file 284 kB)
What do 6-12 wood frogs sound like? (MP3 file 62 kB)
What does a full chorus sound like? (MP3 file 300 kB)
Test your knowledge. One, twelve or a full chorus? (MP3 file 776 kB)
In this photo hides a wood frog. Can you find him?
Skin and backbone of wood frogs
Print off 2 copies of the frog pages. On one page use pasta to glue on
a skeleton, on the second page create the skin of a frog. It can be a
real one or one from your imagination. Remember, you might have to explain
how the frog's color helps it to camoflauge! Cut them out and paste or staple
them together. Now you can see its skin and bones!
Sea Mammals
Learn about the impacts of trash on wildlife with Fish and Game biologist Sue Goodglick and a video, 'Trash Talk'
Marine Mammals and Debris (PowerPoint file 134,487 kB)
Presentation by Sue Goodglick. This is a large file and may take a while to download.
E-Learning
Interactive Lessons
Interactive Lessons
Google slides that are interactive worksheets and ready to use. Copy and save to your computer to adapt them for your students.
Wild Wonders Wild Foods
Kids (and adults) can work through a series of challenges that feature Alaska's Wild Foods! Teachers can direct the entire class to work through guided instruction or assign the activity independently. Its fun to learn about the nutrition and abundance of Alaska's Wild Foods.
Coloring pages
Wetland Types and Descriptions (PDF 8,636 kB)
Ecosystem Types and Coloring Pages (PDF 8,605 kB)
Booklet: Creamer's Field Guide to Birds (PDF 674 kB)
Early Childhood
Activities and resources from Growing Up WILD and Project WILD National Curriculum Guide
*These guides may be purchased when you participate in an ADF&G workshop or by contacting ADF&G
Grow As We Go!
Some animals begin their life looking very different.
Color and cut out the cards for this fun activity and place
their growth stages in order. Which animal has the most stages
and who has the least?
Videos and Media for students
BioBlitz Sitka
Students discover and count the diversity of life in their own backyard
Camera in the Forest
Students from Auke Bay School in Juneau use game cameras to learn about wildlife and science literacy in this fun video.
ADF&G Species Pages
Watch, hear and read about Alaska's Animals on the Fish and Game Website
Moose! Staying Safe Around Urban Moose
A video by students for students- Learn to be safe around moose.
A Bear's Eye View
What do bears do when no one is watching? Check out theses images taken from cameras
attached to radio-collars worn by bears in Anchorage.
Wolverine steals the eggs!
I'm not mean, I'm hungry! A wolverine helps himself to a ground nest of eggs
Release of Wood Bison
North America's largest land mammal is free on the range.
Counting Caribou
This video summarizes the method used by the Alaska Department of Fish and Game to estimate
the population size of various caribou herds in Alaska. A ten-minute bird's eye view of a
wildlife phenomenon few people get to see.