Lesson video

Hi, I'm Mr. Buckingham, and I'm so glad to see you here for today's lesson.

We're going to be learning some fascinating facts about pandas today, and I'm going to be here to help you the whole way through.

Let's get to work.

Today's lesson is called "Researching Information About Pandas' Habitat and Diet" from our unit called "Pandas or Antarctic Animals Non-chronological Report." If you're doing this lesson, you're working towards writing reports about pandas.

By the end of today's lesson, we'll be able to write notes about pandas' habitat and diet.

So today we're going to really focus on gathering information about pandas' habitat and diet in order to use it for writing in the future.

Now, your teacher might tell you a way to record these notes or you might use the worksheet attached to this lesson, but either way, we're going to try and keep those notes safe for future lessons.

Let's get to work.

Here are the keywords for today's lesson.

My turn, your turn.

Source.

Credible.

Origin.

Theme.

And Bullet Points.

Well done.

So a source is someone or something that supplies information.

And something is credible if it can be believed or trusted.

The origin of something is where it starts or comes from.

And a theme of a paragraph is its central idea that the writer wants the audience to engage with deeply.

Bullet points are punctuation marks that lay out key information in a non-fiction text, and in this lesson we also use them for making notes.

Here's our lesson outline for today.

Now, before we do our research, we're going to do a quick recap of apostrophes for possession, 'cause they're going to be very useful in writing our non-chronological reports.

Then we'll research pandas' habitats and we'll finish by researching pandas' diet.

Now, in a report about an animal, we'll often need to show possession using an apostrophe for singular possession.

For instance, "the basking shark's appearance" or "the giant panda's habitat." So we usually show this using apostrophe S after the singular noun.

So you've got "the basking shark," a singular noun, followed by apostrophe S, followed by the thing that belongs to it, the appearance.

And the same for the giant panda.

So here we're referring to the species as a whole, "the basking shark" "the giant panda" as a singular noun.

We're not talking about one specific panda or one specific shark.

We're talking about the whole species.

For instance, "the basking shark's wide mouth enables it to filter huge volumes of water." We don't mean one particular basking shark, we mean the basking shark as a species.

And again, "the giant panda's distinctive black and white fur, makes it instantly recognisable." Here we're saying that the black and white fur belongs to the giant panda as a species.

So we're treating the species as a singular noun.

So it's followed by apostrophe S to show the possession.

So which sentences here use an apostrophe for singular possession correctly? Pause the video and have a go.

Well done.

Good effort.

So A is not correct.

There we've got the apostrophe after the S, which we'd only use for singular possession if the singular noun itself ended in S.

But giant panda ends in 'a,' so we would use apostrophe S as we did in this second example.

So, "The giant panda's scientific name is Ailuropoda melanoleuca." That shows us that the scientific name belongs to the giant panda.

We are treating the giant panda as a singular noun because we're referring to the whole species.

For C, that is correct.

We've got "a panda's legs." So the legs belonging to a panda.

Again, when we say a panda, we mean the panda as a species.

A panda altogether as a species, not just one panda.

So D is not correct because there the apostrophe has been placed after the S.

And because panda is a singular noun ending in 'a,' we place apostrophe S after it to show that singular possession.

Great job if you spotted that.

Now, sometimes we want to use an apostrophe for plural possession too.

For instance, "the sharks' dorsal fins." Here we're saying the dorsal fins belonging to sharks, plural.

And because we've got sharks, a plural noun ending in S, we've put the apostrophe after the S.

We could do the same for pandas.

"Pandas' eye markings." That means the eye markings belonging to more than one panda, to pandas plural.

So because sharks and pandas are plural nouns ending in S, we put the apostrophe after the S.

So we're still saying that these features belong to all the animals in the species, but we're referring to the species now as a plural noun.

And that's just our choice as an author.

So we could write "Pandas' eye markings, help them to identify each other." Here we're saying the eye markings belonging to pandas, plural.

Because pandas plural ends in S, we put the apostrophe after the S.

And the same here.

"Giant pandas' thick legs enable them to forage for a long time." Giant pandas is our plural noun ending in S, we've placed the apostrophe after the S.

And finally, "The pandas' wide molars allow them to crush bamboo stems." The wide molars belong to pandas, plural.

Panda's, plural, ends in S.

So we're putting the apostrophe after the S to show its plural possession.

So in each sentence we have to choose whether we're talking about the animal species as a singular or a plural noun.

Let me show you what I mean.

I could say this: "Pandas' strong jaw muscles allow them to eat for long periods of time." There I've used pandas, plural, so I put the apostrophe after the S.

But I could say: "The giant panda's strong jaw muscles allow it to eat for long periods of time." Here, I've used it as a singular noun, "the giant panda." So here the giant panda ends in 'a,' and it's a singular noun, so I put apostrophe S after that.

And instead of saying "them", I've changed to saying "it" because I'm referring to it as a species, as a singular noun.

Now I must make sure that the whole sentence works with the apostrophe in that way.

For instance, let's look at this sentence.

"The pandas' molars help it to crush bamboo." Well, that's not correct because there I've got pandas, plural, ending in S, followed by the apostrophe.

So I should say "The pandas' molars help them to crush bamboo," because that would be plural, but I've said "it," which is singular.

That doesn't work.

What about this one? "The pandas' molars help them to crush bamboo." Yes, that one does work.

Now, we've got pandas, plural, doing the possession, and then we've got "them" to match that to show we've got plural pandas.

But I could do it another way.

I could change it to a singular noun.

"The panda's molars help it to crush bamboo," and that works too.

So I have to make sure I've matched up whether I'm talking about a singular or plural as my pandas, and then using "it" or "them" appropriately in the rest of the sentence.

They must match.

So which sentences here are using apostrophe for possession correctly to match up with the rest of the sentence? Pause the video and have a think.

Well done.

Let's take a look.

In A, we've got pandas, plural with the apostrophe after the S, and we've got "their fur helps them camouflage." That one matches up, that works.

For B, we put panda apostrophe S.

That doesn't work.

We should have there "pandas apostrophe" before the canines that belong to those pleural pandas.

For C, that's correct.

We've got "The panda's tail" with the apostrophe S showing us we've got singular "the panda." So that one works.

And D is also correct.

We've got "A pandas thick oesophagus," so that is working.

We've got "it" as well in that sentence.

That makes sense.

So we've got singular, "a panda," and the apostrophe S to show it's singular possession.

Really well done if you've got those three.

So let's do our first task for this lesson to practise these apostrophes for possession a bit further.

I'd like you to rewrite the facts about pandas to use an apostrophe for possession, keeping the noun as plural or singular.

For example, I've said "Pandas have thick fur that helps them stay warm." So I've got pandas plural and "them" plural.

So with an apostrophe for possession, it could look like this: "Pandas 'apostrophe' thick fur helps them to stay warm." Can you see that I've kept the noun in the plural and I've kept "them" plural, as well, instead of changing it to "it." All I've done is use an apostrophe for possession and change the sentence to make it work with that apostrophe.

So here are your panda facts.

See if you can keep the noun as either singular or plural, but rewrite the sentence using an apostrophe for possession to show that possession.

Pause the video and have a try.

Well done.

Great effort.

So here are the facts rewritten with apostrophes for possession included.

So try to ensure that you use the right apostrophe for either a plural or a singular noun, and the rest of the sentence matches it.

So for A, I've said: "Pandas 'apostrophe' strong legs enable them to forage for a long time." I've got pandas plural.

So the apostrophes after the S.

For B, I've got "a panda," singular.

"A panda's thick oesophagus allows it to swallow bamboo safely." For C, I've got the panda singular.

"The panda's, excellent climbing skills enable it to find bamboo." And for D, I've got pandas plural.

"The pandas' strong bite allows them to fend off attackers." So I've got the apostrophe after the S there to show it was pandas, plural.

Really well done if you managed to do this.

So we've talked about apostrophes for possession.

Now, let's move on to the research part of our lesson, and we're gonna start by researching pandas' habitats.

So we need to research pandas' habitats for the next paragraph of our non-chronological report.

And we can use different sources to find credible information about its subject.

Remember, sources are where information comes from and if they're credible, they're trustworthy.

So the origin of a source helps us to work out whether it's credible or not.

So you have to think about some questions when deciding whether a source is credible.

Is the information from a source that you recognise? Is the source just one person or is it a well-known organisation? Does the source look like it's serious or we're just trying to be funny? And we need to think, how do these things affect whether we think the information is credible? A good way to check that a piece of information is credible is to use a range of different sources and check.

Do they all agree? So if you find a piece of information about pandas during your research and you can't find that anywhere else online or in books, then perhaps that piece of information might not be credible.

But if all the different sources you look at agree, then that makes it much more likely that that piece of information is credible and trustworthy.

So, can you rank these sources from least credible, number three, to most credible, number one.

Pause the video and have a think.

Well done.

Good effort.

So we could say this is the least credible, a comment on a video by a user you've not seen before.

This would be next, a video by a well-known content creator who has lots of followers.

And this one would be the most credible, a video by a well-known organisation that makes educational materials for children.

Just 'cause something is in the video doesn't mean it's not credible, but we have to think about where that information has come from.

We need to think who has created the information, what is the source? And that's going to affect our decisions about whether the information is credible.

Because remember, in a non-chronological report, we need our information to be factual because it's a nonfiction text.

We are not giving our own opinion.

We are just using factual information that we found from reliable, credible sources.

Now, lots of online content doesn't have to follow rules about how accurate it is.

So it's a good idea to check a few different sources when you're researching online.

So true or false, "A famous video content creator says a fact about pandas in a comedy video.

Alex says, 'We can't use that fact in our report! Is this true or false?" Pause the video and decide.

Well done.

I hope you said that it was false.

Now, why is that? Pause the video and decide, what's the best justification for why it's false to say they shouldn't use that fact or that they can't use that fact in their report.

Well done.

It's B.

So that information could be correct, couldn't it? We have to check if it's credible by looking at some other sources too.

The fact that someone makes comedy videos doesn't mean that everything they say is false.

We have to look at other sources to check is this information reliable? Is it credible? If it is, we can use it in our report because we'll be able to trust that we've got a piece of factual information.

Really well done if you got that one.

So it'd be brilliant if you're able to do some independent research of your own about pandas' habitats.

But in addition to your own research, let's do some together to find out about pandas' habitats.

And an animal's habitat, I'm sure lots of you know, is the place where it lives in the wild.

So here is a map showing pandas' habitats, where pandas live.

Can you see the country of China there with those green areas inside? There isn't very much of the country of China covered by those green areas, but that is the area where pandas still live in the wild.

So pandas live only in a few areas in central China.

The reason for that is that they need bamboo forests, and this is where we find bamboo forests.

Pandas live in mountainous areas which can be very cold and snowy in winter.

Now, there are only around 1,800 pandas living in the wild, hardly any at all.

With a further 650 in captivity around the world.

And that means they're likely to be in zoos.

So we don't have very many pandas left at all in the world.

And you can see they only live in a comparatively small area of China.

So are the following statements about panda habitats true or false? Pause the video and decide.

Well done.

Great effort.

So A, "Pandas live in a range of different habitats." No, that's false.

Just those bamboo forests.

B, "More pandas live in the wild than in captivity." That's true.

Not very many, but it is more.

C says, "In the wild, pandas live in only in certain areas of China." That is true.

And D says, "Pandas can only survive in very warm climates." That's false.

They're used to living in climates that can be very cold and snowy in winter.

Well done if you got those.

So let's find out some more about pandas' habitats.

So pandas once lived in lowland areas too, more flat areas of China.

But as bamboo forests have been destroyed, they've been restricted to the mountains.

So it's almost like they've been forced up into the mountains as their habitats have been reduced and reduced and reduced.

Now a really interesting thing about pandas is that they are very solitary.

They don't live in groups.

In fact, they sleep alone in hollow trees or in caves, and they don't hibernate in winter like many bears either.

So we've got very solitary animals who spend most of their life alone.

In winter, pandas move lower down the mountains so it's warmer, and in the summer they move higher up to be cooler.

But we've said that they are restricted mostly to the mountainous areas because of human destruction of their habitats.

So can you fill in the blanks in the paragraph to check your knowledge of pandas' living habits? Pause the video and see if you can use the words in the right to fill the blanks in the paragraph.

Have a go.

Well done.

Good effort.

So we could say "Pandas live only in mountainous areas of China where there are forests of?" Well done, bamboo.

"They once lived in lowland areas too, but the destruction of their habitats has restricted them to the mountains." "Pandas live alone and they do not hibernate in winter." And finally, "In summers, pandas move higher up in order to cool down." Really well done if you managed to fill those gaps correctly.

Good job.

So let's do our second task for this lesson.

We can use our research now to create bullet point notes to help us with our writing in the future.

So these notes give information about basking sharks habitats, and this is what our notes should look like.

They're not complete sentences, they're notes to trigger our memory in the future to remind us of these facts.

So I've said "coastal waters of North Atlantic Ocean," that's where they live.

I've said "'bask' at surface in sun, but dive to 1000 metres." That's showing me the two things they do to move up and down.

I've said, "some migrate; others stay." I mean they stay where they do for the whole of the year instead of migrating.

And I've said "usually alone, but can gather in huge groups." So these are just notes to help trigger my memory.

So in the same way, can you write five bullet points about pandas' habitats and their living habits? And remember, we don't need to use full sentences for these notes, just bullet points.

Pause the video and have a try.

Well done.

Good effort.

So here are some examples of bullet point notes you might have written about pandas' habitats and their living habits.

We could have said "small areas of China, need bamboo forests," "mountainous areas, snowy in winter," "1,800 in wild; 650 in captivity," "did live in lowlands, but then the habitats were destroyed and so they live in the mountains only now." Can you see how I've got a really complicated idea, compressed down to a few words there by using those arrows and those notes to help me.

Then I've said "live alone, sleep in trees/caves." I've said, "go higher in summer to get cooler" "and go lower in winter to get warmer." Now you could try saying these notes as complete sentences out loud, or even as several sentences for each fact.

And maybe you can try and join some of the sentences together as well.

So if you'd like to practise saying these out loud so that you can get 'em really locked in your brain, and remember the fact that each bullet point note represents.

Pause the video now and have a go at that.

So we've researched pandas' habitats.

Let's move on to researching pandas' diets now.

So the next paragraph of our report will deal with the theme of pandas' diet, what they eat to obtain, get energy to survive.

So here we have some pictures of bamboo.

And a plant called bamboo makes up 98% of pandas' diet, that means almost all of it.

It's a plant with long stems up to 45 metres in length and bushy leaves.

So that means a bamboo plant can grow several times longer than your classroom.

It might even be longer than your school hall or might even be longer than your playground in some of your schools.

So it also has bushy leaves, which you can see in the pictures on the right.

On the left we see a picture of a bamboo forest with those huge long stems towering up towards the sky.

Bamboo stems are extremely thick and woody.

Pandas eat the leaves, stems, and roots of the plant.

So every part.

For example, pandas have a type of thumb that lets them grip on to bamboo stems so they can eat them.

They also have smooth wide molars at the back of their mouth for crushing bamboo stems, and they have strong, powerful jaw muscles so they can chew through thick stems for a long time.

However, we're going to see that bamboo also poses some difficult problems for pandas.

So are the statements below true or false? Pause the video and have a go.

Well done.

Good effort.

A says, "Bamboo makes up a very small proportion of the pandas' diet." That is false.

It's 98%.

B says, "Bamboo stems are long and thick." That is true.

C says, "Pandas only eat the leaves of the bamboo plant." No, that's false.

They eat almost every part.

D says, "Pandas rely heavily on bamboo to survive." Well yes, that's true.

98% of your diet is a huge amount.

So pandas are very reliant on this bamboo.

Good job.

So pandas' reliance on bamboo, as we just said, explains why they can only live in small areas of bamboo forests.

They need that bamboo forest because it's such a huge part of their diet.

There are some other problems with the bamboo diet too.

Now, the funny thing is that pandas struggle to digest bamboo even though it's such a huge part of their diet.

And that means they can't get much energy from it.

So they have to eat it in huge quantities in order to get enough energy to survive.

So to get enough energy to survive, pandas can spend up to 16 hours a day eating up to 38 kilogrammes of bamboo.

Now remember, a panda weighs roughly 110 kilogrammes.

So that's a third of its body weight it has to eat every day in bamboo.

And 16 hours a day of eating only leaves eight hours for anything else they need to do, including sleep.

So bamboo is a hugely important part of panda's diet, but they struggle to digest it, so they have to eat huge amounts in order to get enough energy to survive.

Now, because they eat so much food that they can't digest pandas defecate, that means poo, up to 50 times a day.

So those eight hours they have left over when they're not eating, must a lot of them, be spent defecating as well.

So can you fill in the blanks for the numbers to give the correct statistics for each of these sentences? Pause the video and have a think.

Good job.

Well done.

Hopefully you remember that a statistic is a fact relating to numbers.

So let's see if we've got these right.

A says, "Pandas eat up to?" Well done, 38 kilogrammes of bamboo a day.

For B, "Pandas have to defecate 50 times a day." C says, "Pandas can spend?" Well done, 16 hours a day eating bamboo.

So those are really useful statistics to get locked in your head for writing about pandas later on.

Good job.

Now, although pandas rely heavily on bamboo for their diet, as we've seen, they do sometimes eat other things too, such as beans, eggs, and small animals.

Now, eggs and small animals are obviously animal product.

So that means that pandas are omnivores, just like us.

You might think that they would be herbivores because they've got so much bamboo in their diet, but the fact that they eat those other animal products too makes them omnivores.

Now, another interesting fact about pandas is that because they don't get very much energy from that bamboo, as we discussed, they actually avoid walking on steep ground to conserve the energy, to keep enough energy.

Because remember, they have to eat huge amounts of bamboo just to get enough energy to survive.

So can you correct each incorrect statement about pandas' diets with the accurate information here? So look at the statement and see if you can say, what should the correct statement be? Pause the video and have a go.

Good job.

Well done.

So for A, we've said "Pandas are herbivores because they only eat bamboo." Hmm, that's not right.

Pandas are omnivores because they also sometimes eat animals.

B says, "Pandas always have plenty of energy to roam around." No, pandas have to conserve their energy because bamboo doesn't give them much.

And C says, "Pandas are perfectly designed for eating bamboo." Well, although pandas have some good adaptations for eating bamboo, they struggle to digest it, which causes them, as we've seen, lots of problems. So it's an interesting situation where they're very good at the chewing part, but not good at the digesting part, which leads them to have to eat so much of it in order to survive.

Really interesting facts, and well done for getting them right.

Good job.

So let's do have final task for this lesson.

Let's write our bullet point notes for our paragraph around the theme of the pandas' diet.

So here are the notes I could make about basking sharks' diet.

I've said it's largely zooplankton.

They're two millimetres in length.

They must consume them in vast numbers.

They do it using their mouth to filter water, passively.

They're not sucking the water in.

And sometimes they also eat very small fish.

So now can you write five bullet points about pandas' diet? So try to include as well the problems pandas have with bamboo.

Pause the video and have a go at writing those five bullet points.

Well done.

Okay, let's take a look at some examples of notes we could make about pandas' diets.

And you might have found out more facts of your own as well.

I could say 98% of diet equals bamboo.

And I've got stems, leaves, and roots in brackets to show that all those parts of the plant.

I could say it's a tall plant, 45 metres.

It has thick woody stems. They struggle to digest it.

So I've said that equals, that leads to them having little energy, obtaining little energy from it.

And that leads to them having to eat lots of it, 38 kilogrammes of it a day.

They have to conserve energy and they spend 16 hours a day eating that bamboo.

They defecate 50 times a day and they occasionally eat animals, eggs, and beans, which means they are omnivores.

Now, you might want to try and say these facts as complete sentences or several sentences for each fact out loud to help you remember them.

If you'd like to do that, pause the video now and have a go.

Okay, let's summarise our learning in today's lesson.

We've said that when we research the paragraph about each theme, we have to ensure the information is factual.

And when we research, we should think about the origin of the information to help us decide if it's credible or not.

And we should only include credible information in our notes.

When we research, we can use bullet points to record our notes so that we can refer to them later.

And bullet point notes do not need to be in full sentences.

Really well done for your research in today's lesson.

I hope you've enjoyed finding out all about pandas' habitats and diets, and I'd love for you to go and do some independent research of your own to add to your notes as well.

Well done, again.

And I hope to see you again in a future lesson.

Goodbye.