Draw an animal communication comic strip

Activity Overview

Girl Scouts learn about animal communication by designing a comic strip.

1. Talk about animal communication and how different animals send or receive signals.
2. Have Girl Scouts design a comic strip about one animal and its communication skills.
3. Have Girl Scouts share their comic strip with the larger group if they’d like.

Leader Guidance

Say:

• Do you know that animals communicate in many different ways? Can you think of some examples? (Wait for answers.)
• Animals communicate through the following signals: auditory (sounds), visual (body language, color, etc.), tactile (touch), and chemical (scent and pheromones). Pheromones are special chemical signals that animals of the same species use to communicate with one another. Animal communication allows species to warn others, mark their territory, and bond with friends.
• For example, lions roar to warn rivals to stay away, peacocks show their feathers to attract a mate, mother tigers lick their cubs to bond, and skunks release a spray as a defense weapon.
• Now it’s your turn! Each of you will investigate an animal and study how they communicate. Using your findings, you’ll draw or design a comic strip to show how the animal sends a signal and how others respond to it. You can include speech bubbles in the comic to show messages like “Danger!” or “Food this way!”

Ask Girl Scouts to pick an animal and learn how it communicates, either online or from provided materials. Give each Girl Scout a sheet of paper, and have them create a comic strip showing the animal sending the signal and another animal or person responding to it. Encourage Girl Scouts to add speech bubbles or captions to their drawings. After they finish, ask them to share their comic strips if they’d like.

When everyone is finished, bring the group together and ask questions like:                      

• What message is your animal trying to send?
• How does the receiver understand the animal’s signal?
• Why is this type of communication important for the animal to survive?