November Weeks 1-4
Wow, I'm so far behind on posts! Time to catch up!
We just learned about hibernation! The kids are so into anything involving nature, and especially scary animals like bears!
In teams of 2, we made bear dens from paper bags. They had a surprisingly hard time with this. Luckily, we had lots of spare bags handy for re-dos. :)
Many kids decided to add snow and bears from tissue paper and brown construction paper.
There are some wonderful life-like animal figures available on Safari, Ltd.
We also read The Hat by Jan Brett and made Hedgehogs in hats. They turned out really unique! Hedgehogs keep turning up in our picture books and kids love talking about them.
We also experimented with spirals and silhouettes in a winter scene art project and wrote stories about the characters and setting afterward. Challenging but fun! They did great with the spirals!
Behind the science center, I added some information and pictures about animals that hibernate and adapt in the winter. This generated a lot of discussion during centers and also in the morning during settle-in time.
Ptarmigan is another word that was new to them (Surprising because they're all over the place up here!). We learned the word in August and I was happy to hear the kids using it as soon as they saw this poster!
After a few days, I also added some animal feet/tracks books and pictures.
As well as some animal lacing cards.
Book List
These are our favorite hibernation books!
Animals in Winter by Henrietta Bancroft & Richard G. Van Gelder
Over and Under the Snow by Kate Messner
Every Autumn Comes the Bear by Jim Arnosky
Old Bear by Kevin Henkes
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