If you’re doing a lesson plan on ocean life or the ocean zones, this demonstration is easy, doesn’t take a lot of stuff to create and I think the visual is very helpful for little ones. This activity can also accomplish two things — you can teach children about the different ocean zones as well as which ocean zones some animals live.

You’ll Need:
5 bottles or jars (for each ocean zone)
black and blue food coloring*
ocean animals (optional)
construction paper or cardstock in varying shades of blue, plus one black piece
pen/sharpie for labeling (I used labels I printed out)

You’ll want to fill your bottles with a little bit of water and add varying degrees of blue food coloring to four of them, plus one bottle with black water for the trench zone. I started with the next darkest after black and then used that bottle to pour a little into the others and then adding more water to make each of them lighter than the previous one. You can label them according to the graphic above, by writing on the lids, using labels, or aligning the paper up with the corresponding bottle.

I already had a package of ocean animals I purchased from Amazon. These aren’t essential, but the visual helps, I think. In my package, I didn’t have any creatures that lived in the abyss or the trenches. Which is the perfect time to explain that most ocean life live in the top two ocean zones (the sunlight and the twilight zones). There is the most sunlight in the top two ocean zones, which is why most creatures can survive there.

Underwater plants that live in the sunlight zone can use the sunlight to make food using photosynthesis (we’ll save that one for another day). Some animals that live below the twilight zone have adapted to the environment and make their own light to see.

The further down in the ocean we go, the less light and greater the pressure.

Depending on the age of your children/students, you can research together what kinds of animals live in each of the ocean zones. You can use plastic ones like I did, or you can find pictures of sea life and print them out and cut them and glue onto the paper designated for that animal’s zone. You can also use the bottles or jars and add plastic animals to the appropriate ocean zone and make a sensory/calming bottle.

Click here to purchase the Ocean Life Bundle! 

*There are affiliate links in this post. If you click on a link and make a purchase, I receive a small commission at no extra cost to you.