Plants of the World

#TheCompleteSeries6lessons

Containing lesson plans, slides for each lesson, differentiated activity ideas and a range of printable resources, these ‘Plants of the World’ Geography lessons for KS2 are a great way to teach your children more about the amazing world of plants.

This scheme of work is also part of a Topic Bundle. Perfect if you are teaching 'Plants' as a cross-curricular topic.

#Lesson1WeirdandWonderful

In the first lesson in this series, your class will discover some of the strangest plants on Earth and find out where in the world they can be found. Using their knowledge of the seven continents of the world and learning more about the location of different countries, your class will find out where they can find the world’s largest flower, plants that smell like rotting flesh or trees with rainbow barks.

#Lesson2Biomes

In this lesson, children will consider why different plants grow in different parts of the world. They will learn about different climate zones and where they are located and learn the difference between a climate zone and a biome. They will then identify plants that grow in a particular biome and where these biomes are around the world.

#Lesson3PlantsinExtremeEnvironments

Now that your class understands what a biome is, they will look at how plants survive in the most extreme biomes on Earth - desert biomes. They will learn what hot and cold deserts are like and start to understand how the plants that live there have adapted to suit the extreme climate conditions.

#Lesson4Agriculture

This lesson starts by challenging children to think about all the plants they know that we eat. They are then given a brief overview of some of the staple foods in our diet that come from plants, and what agriculture is. They will find out why some crops grow better in different parts of the world than others, and how plants get from the fields to our tables.

#Lesson5PlantUses

In this lesson, children are challenged to organise a set of objects into those we get from plants and those we don’t, before looking at some of the many ways in which humans use plants, including for wood, paper, medicine, fabrics, rubber and cosmetics.

#Lesson6MegaDiversity

In the final lesson of this series, children will learn what the terms ‘biodiversity’ and ‘mega-diversity’ mean before finding out where the seventeen mega-diverse countries in the world are. They then have the opportunity to carry out their own research into one of these countries, finding out about endemic and other plants that can be found there.

Free Overview (Medium-Term Plan)

Download a free overview to support your teaching of this scheme of work.

Free Assessment Grid

Download a free, editable assessment grid to support your teaching of this scheme of work.

Curriculum Objectives covered

• KS2 - locate the world’s countries, using maps to focus on Europe (including the location of Russia) and North and South America, concentrating on their environmental regions, key physical and human characteristics, countries, and major cities
• KS2 - describe and understand key aspects of physical geography, including: climate zones, biomes and vegetation belts, rivers, mountains, volcanoes and earthquakes, and the water cycle
• KS2 - describe and understand key aspects of human geography, including: types of settlement and land use, economic activity including trade links, and the distribution of natural resources including energy, food, minerals and water
• KS2 - use maps, atlases, globes and digital/computer mapping to locate countries and describe features studied