Ticks, Disease, and Climate Module

Provided by: Gulf of Maine Research Institute |Published on: January 15, 2024

Lesson Plans

5678

Synopsis

In this four-lesson module, students will learn about the increasing tick-borne diseases in the Northeast due to climate change.
Students will read about ticks, play a memory game to distinguish types of ticks, play an interactive game modeling the life cycle of a tick, analyze maps to determine the relationship between tick range, Lyme disease, temperature, and precipitation, and create an action plan to protect the community from tick-borne disease.

Subjects: Biology, Earth and Space Sciences

Authors: Gulf of Maine Research Institute

Region: North America, USA - Northeast, United States, Maine

Languages: English

Positives

Students will love the engaging games and many opportunities to collaborate with their peers.
The action plan gets students positively involved in their community.

Additional Prerequisites

The module has four lessons, but some may require more than one class period. Teachers may need to spend about 5-8 class periods on the module.
The module provides background information with sources, guiding questions/discussion topics, student pages, class slides, and assessment rubrics for each lesson.
There is some minimal prep teachers will need to do before each lesson, such as printing, cutting, setting up stations, etc.
Teachers need 10-15 six-sided dice for two of the lessons.
Students should be familiar with climate change and the specific local impacts in the Northeast region. If additional foundational instruction is needed, there is a link to two lessons that teachers can add to this module.

Differentiation

The action plan in the final lesson can act as a summative assessment for the module, and the guide includes a rubric for this.
There are multiple options for how teachers can implement the action plans in the community.
Cross-curricular connections can be made with English language arts classes when students read nonfiction text on ticks and synthesize information from multiple sources.
Teachers can make cross-curricular connections with math classes in the data collection, analysis, and graphing portions.

Scientist Notes

Teaching Tips

Standards

Resource Type and Format