Badlands National Park Lesson Plan: Bright Eyes

Bright Eyes

Age/Grade Appropriate
Kindergarten – 2nd

Objectives:

Learn the existence of night-vision and one of its byproducts (reflective eyes)

Location

Classroom and room that can be darkened

Background

All nocturnal animals see better in the dark than we do. They have a biological advantage. In the back of the inside of their eyes, they have an organ called a tapetum. It is a thin coating of iridescent tissue that reflects light. Tapetums cause the eyeshine that we see when our car headlights find a deer, or a badger, or a house cat. By reflecting and bouncing more light around inside the eye, they allow the retina to collect more light information to be sent back to the brain. The reason that eyeshine colors differ among different species of animal is because animals have different colored tapetums. They can range from green-blue, to yellow-orange, to reddish.

Badlands National Park has a many different species of nocturnal creatures. Coyotes, badgers, great-horned owls, and bats are just some of the creatures of the night. The most recently famous nocturnal critter in the Badlands is the Black-Footed Ferret. These animals are one of the most endangered species in the world. As part of a ferret reintroduction program, we now have over 100 ferrets in our park. Because they are almost entirely nocturnal, the only way park biologists can monitor these prairie dog town inhabitants is to go out at night with powerful flashlights and search the landscape for very bright blue-green ferret eyeshine. This activity models the eyes of nocturnal creatures and can start good discussions of both wildlife and the anatomy of eyes.

Materials

chalk

ruler

black construction paper

scissors

empty coffee can (inside bottom must be shiny)

rubber band

flashlight

Vocabulary

Night vision

Nocturnal

Reflect light

Coyote, badger, great-horned owl, Prairie Dog, Black-Footed Ferret

Method

Lecture and Dramatization

Procedure

With the chalk, draw an oval about 3 inches long and 1 inch wide in the center of the paper.

Cut the oval out of the paper. Discard the oval cutout.

Place the paper over the open end of the can so that the oval hole in the paper is in the center of the can’s opening. Secure the paper to the can with the rubber band.

Take the can and the flashlight to a room that you can make very dark, and turn out the lights.

Hold the can in front of you as far away as you can at eye level so that the hole in the paper faces you.

Look toward the hole in the paper. You will find that it’s difficult or impossible to see the hole (or the can, if the room is very dark).

Hold the flashlight near your face so that the light points at the hole in the paper.

Look toward the hole in the paper. The light from the flashlight will reflect off the shiny bottom of the can, making the hole appear to glow.

Take this discussion wherever you like, nocturnal animals, eye anatomy, etc.

Extension

Give examples of other things that can be done along the same line here.

Resources

Janice VanCleave’s Play and Find Out about Nature. VanCleave, Janice. John Wiley & Sons, 1997

Black Ferret Re-Introduction at Badlands National Park (http://www.nps.gov/badl/exp/issues.htm#bff)