Introducing the game to a class (Year 5/6)

I think this is a brilliant game for learning about biodiversity.

I went into a class of year 5/6s and have written a plan for how to teach it - using A4 cards and getting the children to move around the room to find another person with the same food chain number / size, etc. This then progresses onto playing a game as the whole class, then in teams with the small cards

I used a rainforest as the setting and also wrote some new event cards as I wanted to show the threats to rainforests

- Cleared for cattle ranching (EFFECT: convert to grassland terrain permanently - discard all incompatible species)
- Logging (EFFECT: convert to urban terrain permanently - discard played species cards that are without food)
- Cleared for soy beans (EFFECT: convert to grassland terrain permanently - discard all adjacent species)
- Roadbuilding (PLAY on one SPECIES card on any land-based terrain. Also play another event card from your discard pile or hand. EFFECT: Convert to URBAN terrain permanently and effects of second event card)

I also used the habitat loss card and the wildfire card (although I really wanted a 'Land cleared by burning'

This was all done very last minute, so I didn't send the cards to you to be done properly, I had to bodge it together by snipping parts of the card, etc. I pasted the cards I wanted onto a sheet in 9s, as having only 6 on a page seemed a waste of card. Also, I don't have proper pictures for the new event cards. I needed some more different species as well, I had to use a lot of generic 'trees'.

I would like to be able to make these into a proper set, how can I do it? Also, I can provide the files for the lesson plan if they might be useful to other people but I can't see how to attach them to this post.

This is so awesome!

And your ideas for event cards is great. Unfortunately, we are at the mercy of the good donations of others for images, so getting images for these cards may take a while. Hopefully, however, highlighting them in places like this forum is a good start to see if some artists can jump in!

Note that the site formats cards 6 per page (and not 9) because there's so many variations of different printer set-ups, that the 6 card layout was the most versatile without strange formating things happening.

As for the lesson plan, it sounds like something that could totally live in our "decks" section. i.e. if you list all the cards you did use, plus the ones you wish you had, we can slowly try to build the deck and eventually exhibit on the site (with your lesson plan). We could call it the "Why the rainforest is in danger" deck (or something), and of course, attribute you as the author.

Anyway, if you want, send on what you have below (or via email at db@interchange.ubc.ca) and we can go from there.