Zoo Animals: Week 2

This week we finished up our study of zoo animals! We started out the week by reading the precious story "A Sick Day for Amos McGee". Amos is a zookeeper who gets sick one day and all of the animals come to his house to take care of him for a change. After we read the story and discussed it, I had each student come up to the front and act out a zoo animal for us to guess. They loved acting out the animals and loved guessing what animal their classmates were pretending to be! During centers we made Mat Man and I let them personalize it. They have gotten so good at drawing people! 

After lunch we switched things up a bit. Instead of going out to the playground I took them to the backyard area. I gave each of the students a tin can to collect acorns in. You wouldn't believe how fun they thought this was! They all went off to their own corners and started filling up their cans.

The next day we read the book "When Lulu Went to the Zoo". After reading it I asked them if they thought animals in the zoo liked being in cages. We discussed this for awhile and then we talked about how most zoos get their animals by rescuing them from the wild. During centers we had a fun treat. I let the students paint animal crackers with edible paint! I put different colored food coloring into 4 different cups of corn syrup. The students dipped a quetip into the color they wanted and then painted their cracker. 

During another center we had the animal toss again! 

Wednesday we read the book "Giraffe" and discussed giraffes and some vocabulary words: herd, calf, hoof, Africa, and grassland. During centers the students got to make a giraffe! I traced their foot for the head and then they painted some brown spots on it. 

It was too cold to go outside on Wednesday so we stayed inside and did some mini fine motor centers. 

We had chain links, lacing, number tracing, straw cutting, and number beading. 

Thursday we read the book "Joey to Kangaroo" and discussed kangaroos and some vocabulary words: Joey, mob, pouch, marsupial, and Australia. I even learned a few new facts about kangaroos from this book! During centers I had the students practice tracing and writing their name. 

Friday we read the book "Gorillas" and discussed the difference between monkeys and gorillas. During centers the students made their own monkey! 

This student said he wanted to make his monkey look "tough"! Haha

We had a new center Friday that the kids loved, a tool center! 

That concludes our study of zoo animals! Next week we will begin our study of Arkansas!