Living Root Garden School • Creatures Great & Small • Name: ______________________
🔍 The Case
The case of the silver trails — shiny lines wind across the path, and soft leaves are nibbled overnight. Who was out while we slept?
Go out on a damp morning or after rain and look under pots, boards, and big leaves — those dark, damp undersides are where snails and slugs hide by day.
Snails and slugs are the same kind of animal — soft-bodied gastropods (say it: GAS-tro-pods), cousins of clams and octopuses. The difference is luggage: a snail carries a shell, and a slug left its shell behind.
Follow the slime: snails and slugs move on a wave of slime that is slippery going forward and grippy going back, so one foot can crawl up walls and over rough edges without getting cut. A shiny silver trail means a slowpoke passed by.
Rule out the lookalikes: a long, pointy-shelled snail is a decollate snail — it hunts other snails and slugs, so it is a friend, not a pest. A snail bigger than your fist is not a garden snail at all — do not touch it, tell a grown-up, and wash your hands after handling any snail or slug.
Ask: Three hiding spots, one damp morning — which cover will hide the most snails and slugs? Write your guess before you lift anything.
Try: Lift three different covers on the same damp morning — a pot, a board, and a pile of leaves. Count the snails and the slugs under each one, write the numbers down, and put everything back where you found it.
Stretch (Teens & Growers ready for more): Count snails and slugs under three different covers on the same morning and compare the totals. Which cover wins — and what makes it the dampest, darkest hiding spot of the three?
Tell: Fill in the log below — how many snails, how many slugs, and where each one was hiding — then finish this sentence in words or a labeled drawing: “The ___ cover won because ___.”
Date
What I saw
What surprised me
Date: ____/____/____
Date: ____/____/____
Date: ____/____/____
Date: ____/____/____
🛠️ Build It
Draw your biggest snail shell from the top and from the side — count the spirals and write the number on your drawing.
🗣️ Be the Teacher
Show someone a snail and a slug and tell them how to tell the two apart — in your own words, no reading off the packet.
🏅 I can…
☐ I can tell a snail from a slug by its shell.
Portfolio check
☐ Guide read
☐ Case solved
☐ Ask, Try, Tell done
☐ Build It filed: Census table + shell sketches
☐ Taught someone
☐ Badge earned: I can tell a snail from a slug by its shell.
Living Root Garden School • livingrootgarden.com/homeschool/ • Free — print as many copies as you like. File this sheet with your portfolio log. Sprouts do the Read, the Case, and Build It; Growers try the Ask, Try, Tell stretch when ready; Teens do the whole packet — including teaching it back.