1. Teacher Guide
This lesson is designed to teach kids to ask a critical thinking question that you can’t just put into a search box to solve. To do that, we encourage them with smaller questions that search can help them answer. Make sure that you read the notes for each slide: they not only give you teaching tips but also provide answers and hints so you can help the kids if they are having trouble.
Remember, you can always send feedback to the Bing in the Classroom team at You can learn more about the program at bing.com/classroom and follow the daily lessons on our Partners In Learning site.
Want to extend today’s lesson? Consider using Skype in the Classroom to arrange for your class to chat with another class in today’s location. And if you are using Windows 8, you can also use the Bing apps to learn more about this location and topic; the Travel and News apps in particular make great teaching tools.
Nell Bang-Jensen is a teacher and theater artist living in Philadelphia, PA. Her passion for arts education has led her to a variety of roles including developing curriculum for Philadelphia Young Playwrights and teaching at numerous theaters and schools around the city. She works with playwrights from ages four to ninety on developing new work and is especially interested in alternative literacies and theater for social change. A graduate of Swarthmore College, she currently works in the Artistic Department of the Wilma Theater and, in addition to teaching, is a freelance actor and dramaturg. In 2011, Nell was named a Thomas J. Watson Fellow and spent her fellowship year traveling to seven countries studying how people get their names.
This lesson is designed to teach the Common Core State Standard: Reading: Informational Text
CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RI.3.3 Describe the relationship between a series of historical events, scientific ideas or concepts, or steps in technical procedures in a text, using language that pertains to time, sequence, and cause/effect.
CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RI.3.5 Use text features and search tools (e.g., key words, sidebars, hyperlinks) to locate information relevant to a given topic efficiently.
CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RI.3.7 Use information gained from illustrations (e.g., maps, photographs) and the words in a text to demonstrate understanding of the text (e.g., where, when, why, and how key events occur).

2. Why do gray whales migrate to give birth?
© Frans Lanting/SuperStock
Having this up as kids come in is a great settle down activity. You can start class by asking them for thoughts about the picture or about ideas on how they could solve the question of the day.

3. Why do gray whales migrate to give birth?
While nearby Cabo San Lucas is known for its party-like atmosphere, San Jose del Cabo is a more reserved, relaxed city, with a stronger concentration on the surrounding natural wonders. Many visitors come to catch a glimpse of migrating whales. Here at the southern tip of Mexico’s Baja California peninsula, coastal lagoons such as this one provide safe harbor to migrating gray whale mothers, who seek the safety of the lagoon to birth and raise their calves during the winter months.
Depending on time, you can either have students read this silently to themselves, have one of them read out loud, or read it out loud yourself.

4. Why do gray whales migrate to give birth?1
Web/Map Search
Where do gray whales migrate? Find these places on a map. What can you guess about the environmental conditions of these places based on their locations? 2
Web Search
What is the timeline for the migration of gray whales? When do they migrate south? When do they migrate back north? 3
What are the predators of gray whales? How might this relate to the whales’ migration to give birth? 4
How do adult gray whales keep themselves warm in cold water? What about baby gray whales? 5
What is the average water temperature where gray whales live in the summer? What about where they migrate to in the winter?
There are a couple of ways to use this slide, depending on how much technology you have in your classroom. You can have students find answers on their own, divide them into teams to have them do all the questions competitively, or have each team find the answer to a different question and then come back together. If you’re doing teams, it is often wise to assign them roles (one person typing, one person who is in charge of sharing back the answer, etc.)

5. Why do gray whales migrate to give birth?5
Minutes
You can adjust this based on how much time you want to give kids. If a group isn’t able to answer in 5 minutes, you can give them the opportunity to update at the end of class or extend time.

6. Why do gray whales migrate to give birth?1
Web/Map Search
Where do gray whales migrate? Find these places on a map. What can you guess about the environmental conditions of these places based on their locations? 2
Web Search
What is the timeline for the migration of gray whales? When do they migrate south? When do they migrate back north? 3
What are the predators of gray whales? How might this relate to the whales’ migration to give birth? 4
How do adult gray whales keep themselves warm in cold water? What about baby gray whales? 5
What is the average water temperature where gray whales live in the summer? What about where they migrate to in the winter?

7. Why do gray whales migrate to give birth?1
Web/Map Search
Where do gray whales migrate? Find these places on a map. What can you guess about the environmental conditions of these places based on their locations?
(Possible queries: “where do gray whales migrate?”, “Bing/Maps: Baja, California”, “Bing/Maps: Bering Sea“).
Students should first conduct a search to find the names of the places where gray whales live and the places that they migrate to. For example, from:
The gray whale migrates between its summer feeding grounds in the North Pacific and Bering Sea and its winter breeding grounds in the lagoons of Baja California.
Students should then find these locations on a map. For example, they can look at a map such as the one found here: and then zoom out until the whale’s northernmost home (The Bering Sea) and southernmost home (Baja, California) are both visible. Students should understand from the map that the whales are traveling in a southeast direction each fall, and then back up again in a northwest direction each spring. They should also form hypotheses about the environmental conditions, based on these locations. For example, students may guess that way up north, the water might be much colder for the whales than the water is near Baja, California.

8. Why do gray whales migrate to give birth?2
Web Search
What is the timeline for the migration of gray whales? When do they migrate south? When do they migrate back north?
(Possible queries: “when do gray whales migrate?”, “gray whales, migration timeline”).
From
Almost all of the gray whales spend the summer months (June, July, and August) in the Bering Sea area between Alaska and Russia. A few even venture north into the Arctic Ocean. In the fall the majority of the population migrates south, along the west coast of Canada and the United States, ending up in the quiet lagoons of Baja California during the winter months (January, February, and March). In the spring the population returns to the Bering Sea area. This 12,000 mile roundtrip may be the longest migration of any mammal on Earth.

9. Why do gray whales migrate to give birth?3
Web Search
What are the predators of gray whales? How might this relate to the whales’ migration to give birth?
(Possible queries: “predators of gray whales”, “gray whale migration, avoiding predators”).
From
The orca is the main predator of the gray whale besides man. When orcas are around the gray whale goes into hiding, coming close to shore, hiding behind rocks or in kelp. Gray whales will also float near the surface, breathing lightly to avoid detection. Transient pods of ocras hunt in packs and savor the tongue and throat blubber of gray whales, often leaving the rest of the carcass. Calves are especially vulnerable. During the northward migration, gray whale mothers and calves travel very close to shore in an attempt to avoid detection by predators. Orcas have been seen off Piedras Blancas. Great white sharks scavenge carcasses and may kill small calves.

10. Why do gray whales migrate to give birth?4
Web Search
How do adult gray whales keep themselves warm in cold water? What about baby gray whales?
(Possible queries: “how do gray whales stay warm?”, “gray whales protecting self against cold”, “do baby gray whales have blubber?”).
Students should first conduct a search to see how adult gray whales keep themselves warm in cold water. They should notice that “blubber” is a common answer. For example, from
The blubber is thick enough (5 or 6 inches) to provide insulation against the freezing water. A gray whale's normal internal temperature is about 99 degrees F (38 degrees C). But at the northern end of the migration trail, whales are often in water that is only 37 to 39 degrees F (3 to 4 degrees C). Brrrrr! The blubber layer keeps their bodies from losing valuable heat. Blubber is not pure fat, but a mix of fibrous, fatty, and connective tissues honeycombed with large oil-filled cells. The thickest layers of blubber are found in pregnant females because they have precious unborn babies to protect. Blubber is so good at keeping whales warm that even after death, their rate of body cooling is very slow.
Students should then conduct an additional search to see if baby gray whales are able to protect themselves from the cold in the same way. For example, from
The moms do have plenty of fat to keep them warm, but the babies don't! When gray whales are born they have practically no fat on their bodies. In fact their skin hangs in folds along their bodies and they look like little tadpoles. So it is much better for these babies to be born in warmer waters away from the cold of the Arctic where mom can nurse them until they get nice and fat for the return trip to Alaska. Baby gray whales gain weight very quickly and grow about 9 feet by the time they are weaned .

11. Why do gray whales migrate to give birth?5
Web Search
What is the average water temperature where gray whales live in the summer? What about where they migrate to in the winter?
(Possible queries: “migration of gray whales”, “average water temperature, Bering Sea”, “average water temperature, Baja, California”).
Students may need to first conduct a search (or ask classmates working on other questions) to determine that the gray whales travel from The Bering Sea to Baja, California each year. They should then look up the respective water temperatures of both places. For example, from
Water temperatures on the surface average from 34° F (1° C) in the north to 41° F (5° C) in the south.
And from
Baja California water temperatures, current sea tmp: 17.8°C / 64°F .
In other words, there is roughly a ° F difference in the temperatures of these bodies of water.

12. Why do gray whales migrate to give birth?
Students should pull together the information they have gathered to understand that each fall gray whales migrate from the cold waters near The Bering Sea to the warmer waters of Baja, California to give birth. They should consider both temperature and avoidance of predators to be factors in this migration. Students should understand that in the shallower waters near Baja, California the whales (and baby whales) stay closer to the shore to avoid their main predator: orcas. They should also think about how the degree temperature difference between these waters is be better for the baby whales. Although adult whales have blubber to keep them warm, baby whales are born without it. Therefore, if the gray whales did not migrate in the winter, the northern waters near the Bering Sea would be too cold for their babies!