We’ve studied animals before here and there, but never as a whole so I thought it was due time! Join us this week as we dive into animal groups and the characteristics that make them special. We’ll be covering mammals, birds, fish and reptiles- I know there are more but it’s Prek so I figured we’d leave it at that! You can always add to it if you want to and extend it to two weeks with insects, amphibians, crustaceans, and mollusks! Without further adieu, let’s explore the animal kingdom!
–Literacy:
-Cut and paste mammal characteristics: Technically this is a science activity, but this week there will be some crossover since our theme is science based. I printed these mammal diagrams from Teachers Pay Teachers, then had my littles cut out the words and find the correct ones for each part of the diagram using their letter sound knowledge (ie. I’d say “Mammals have fur and hair…can you find the card that says f-f-fur and h-h-hair?”). I helped my 3 year old read his, but my 5 year old figured it out independently.
-Animal ABC order: I printed these animal ABC order cards then worked with my 5 year old to put them in alphabetical order.
-Arctic animals early reader: I printed these early readers, then we read and colored each page together. You can also discuss which animal group each creature belongs to and why.
–Animal sentence builder page: My little really enjoyed doing this one! The set comes with a bunch of pages with different animals on them. You just have your little cut out the words then use them to make a sentence. After they glue the sentence down, they practice writing it.
-All about your favorite animal writing prompt: This week I had my little write a story all about his favorite animal.
-Animal book list: There are SO many animal books out there! Here are the ones we read this week!
–Math:
-Animal nonstandard measuring: I printed this animal measuring page then had my littles cut out the “ruler” and measure each critter on the page.
-Animal number ordering: I printed these animal number ordering cards and gave my little each set of 6, one animal at a time and had him order them from least to greatest. If your little doesn’t have a strong knowledge of tens and ones and what each place value means, you can just practice reading the numbers together (ie. 24 would be: we have 2 tens and 4 ones…the value of this number is 24). For my 3 year old I pulled out the numbers between 1 and 10 and then asked him to find each one that would come next from least to greatest.
–Animal word problems: I helped my little read these and he used pictures to solve them.
-Shape sort: My 3 year old worked on this oval vs. circle shape sorting activity while my 5 year old completed the activity above. This activity and the three below it all came from this animal math activity pack from Teachers Pay Teachers. There were a ton of activities in the pack- you could really use it all week!
-Animal graph questions: I helped my little read the questions about this animal graph. He wrote his answers independently.
-Which has more: My 3 year old completed this page while my 5 year old worked on his graph. (He’s pretty much done with nap time, and he gets sad if he doesn’t have an activity to do along with his brother, but since they’re a bit too hard for him, these little pages were perfect!
-Fill in the missing numbers: I printed this fill in the missing numbers page then had my 5 year old complete it…note: each line starts a new sequence.
-Big or small sorting: While my 5 year old worked on the activity above, my 3 year old did this smaller and larger sorting activity.
–Science: Each day we read a book about a different animal then wrote down their characteristics on a chart.
-Animal group sorting: On the last day of our week, I gave my littles several animal cards and had them group them into mammals, birds, reptiles, and fish.
–Art:
-Mammal hair art: I printed bears (but you can do any mammal) then gave my littles some yarn to glue on the bears for fur.
-Fish scale craft: I printed some fish then had my littles add “scales” to them using sequins.
-Cut out a reptile: I gave my 5 year old a piece of faux leather to represent animal scales (though now that I think about it, leather usually comes from cows… lol Oh well!) with a lizard drawn in white crayon on the back. He cut the lizard out, then added a googly eye to finish the project.
-Birds have feathers craft: I cut out some birds for my littles then had them glue feathers on them. As they worked I explained the different types of feathers birds have using the ones on the table- downy feathers to keep the bird warm, and stiffer flight feathers to help the bird fly.
-Favorite animal painting: I had my littles think of their favorite animal, then paint it. My 5 year old painted a bunny (with help) and a brown duck, my 3 year old painted a speckled bird.
–Extras:
-Letter of the week: Yy, each day we do a different activity focused on our letter- introduction/have your little practice it on the chalkboard (or white board), think of words that start with the letter and make a list, workbook letter writing practice, workbook word writing practice.
-Word of the week: will, each day we do a different activity focused on our word- introduction/sound the word out/have your little practice writing it on the chalkboard or whiteboard, word family list- think of other words that rhyme with your word of the week, use the word in a sentence (have your little come up with the sentence and write it for them) then have your little illustrate the sentence, and workpage practice.
-Bible verse: This month’s Bible verse is “Do nothing out of selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility, consider others as more important than yourselves.” Philippians 2:3 I write each word in the verse on a post-it, stick them to the wall then have my little point to each word and read it each day all month.
-Character trait of the month: consideration…this word is reviewed and posted at the start of the month then each time one of my littles freely demonstrates generosity I use the word to specifically praise what they’re doing and encourage the trait in them. (ie. “That was very considerate of you to split your cookie with me!”)
–Shopping/supply list:
- books on mammals, birds, reptiles and fish
- animal cards
- faux leather
- feathers
- sequins
- yarn
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