Wildlife Art Activity
CLICK HERE for the Wildlife Art Activity
The Alabama Wildlife Federation (AWF) strives to educate Alabama’s youth about our state’s rich biodiversity through our conservation education programs. This highly-educational Wildlife Art Activity provides an opportunity for teachers to integrate art throughout the curriculum including science, social studies, geography, reading, writing and technology. The guidelines for this activity require students to choose one specific wildlife species indigenous to Alabama, and then research the species and its habitat in Alabama. This encourages students to read and utilize regional field identification guides such as the National Audubon Society Field Guide to the Southeastern States, educational books like Scot Duncan’s Southern Wonder: Alabama’s Surprising Biodiversity, and our Student Exploration Link webpages. Thus, the students will learn not only about Alabama’s rich biodiversity but also the ecosystems that support this biodiversity.
Alabama is one of the most biologically diverse places on Earth. The state ranks fifth in the nation in plant and animal diversity, and first in the nation in freshwater species diversity. This wealth of natural biodiversity stems from the state’s diverse physiographic regions, abundance of water resources, and moderate climate. Alabama is home to a wide variety of wildlife including 70 different species of amphibians, 85 species of native reptiles, 433 species of birds, 62 native mammal species, more than 450 species of fish, and thousands of insect species. Alabama also has a high number of “at risk” and imperiled species, and only Hawaii has lost more species to extinction. The primary cause for the decline, extirpation and extinction of these animals is the loss of habitat that provides the food, water, shelter and breeding areas for Alabama’s wildlife to flourish.
While participating in this Wildlife Art Activity, students will go outside to explore their school grounds to determine if the area currently provides the habitat requirements for the wildlife species they have chosen or if the habitat could be created on the school grounds. After evaluating the school grounds, the students and teachers are encouraged to develop a schoolyard wildlife habitat or enhance their current habitat so that it can be used as an educational tool through the Alabama Outdoor Classroom Program. This will enable students to get outdoors and personally observe local wildlife in its natural habitat, recording their behavior and characteristics just as naturalists, ecologists and artists do, so they can more easily depict the wildlife in its natural habitat in their artwork.
CLICK HERE for the Wildlife Art Activity .



CLICK HERE for the Wildlife Art Activity .