Animals | Community Connections: Activity 2

Activity 2: My Agricultural Protein Footprint (40 min + sharing)

Students compare the amount of plant material needed to produce the animal protein in their or the school diets to the amount of beans needed to get an equivalent amount of protein.

Materials You Provide

  • Graph paper (1 per student)
  • Calculators

Resources Provided

Setup

Students will need to have completed the first two columns of the Animals in Our Diets Worksheet.

Directions

1. Students calculate their agricultural protein footprints

Students need to have completed columns 1 and 2 of Table 1. Students use Table 2 to calculate the amount of feed/plant material needed to produce the animal protein they consumed or that they found in school meals. They record these in the last column of Table 1. Sample calculations are shown in Assessing Animal proteins in our diet Worksheet.

Assessment

Question 1 is the main assessment item. It is an indicator of how well students can apply to a new substance what they learned about cellular respiration from the unit. Students’ answers to question 10 are an indicator of students’ understanding of the tradeoffs of eating animal-based vs plant-based protein.

Tips

You may choose to model the calculations that students will need to do.

Extending the Learning

If students are interested and you have time, students can explore how people from around the world get their protein at http://www.nationalgeographic.com/what-the-world-eats/