Teaching overview
Learning points
- Animals traveling in groups often have special warning calls to alert the group to predators.
- Humpback whales sing to each other during mating season.
- Sometimes different species of animal can communicate with each other.
Curriculum keywords
- Body systems
- Human body
- Senses
5 things you didn't know
Elephants nuzzling
1. Humans have developed speech to communicate with each other, but did you know that animals have communication systems as well? They use a range of different noises, visual signs, smells and touch.
Prairie dogs move in groups
2. Animals that travel in groups often have special alert signals that they use to let their friends know when danger is around – prairie dogs have different warning calls for different types of predator.
Humpback whales sing
3. Humpback whales communicate by singing to each other during the mating season – these courting songs can last as long as half an hour.
Alex the parrot
4. Some parrots can mimic human words. Although they don’t understand what they are saying, some have been known to use words intelligently – Alex, an African gray parrot, knew more than 100 words!
Warthog and mongoose
5. Scientists have observed different species of animals communicating with each other. Warthogs lie down next to mongooses to signal that they’re ready to be picked clean of ticks.
Spark a discussion
- Why do animals make different sounds?
- Can you think of ways humans communicate without using words?
- Why do you think prairie dogs use different warning calls for different predators?
Twig Science: A Complete Pre-K–8 Program for the NGSS
Immersive Investigations with High-Quality Multimedia
- Investigating, designing, building, and understanding phenomena
- Hands-on, digital, video, and print investigations
- Synchronous/asynchronous distance learning