All About Animals

This week we finished up our All About Animals unit of study.  We spent about 6 weeks researching and writing about animals.  I love this unit of study each year because it engages kids while covering nonfiction reading, writing, and science standards.  The end result is a chapter book full of nonfiction text features showcasing their learning.

I give my students a choice between 8 different animals to learn about: snakes, elephants, dolphins, sharks, penguins, butterflies, orangutans, and bears.  I have chosen these animals strategically.  They cover a variety of animal groups (reptiles, mammals, insects, etc.) and habitats (ocean, dessert, polar, etc.).  For my lessons I use frogs (amphibians) as my animal for research together as a class.

A benefit to using just these 8 animals to choose from is that I have collected lots of books to be used for research.  Also, we visit the Indianapolis Zoo as a culmination of our learning and I know all of these animals can be found there, which is very exciting for the kids and extends their learning.

Okay, enough about animal selection... on to the writing!

One of the areas I hit hard during this unit is nonfiction text features.  Here is just one student's book (not all of it... just a taste)…

Front Cover

Title Page

Dedication Page

Table of Contents

Chapter with Headings and Sub-Headings

Diagram

Glossary

(We bolded words throughout the book and then included those words in a glossary.)

Meet the Author

Back Cover

(Note:  This kid added the reading level info all on his own.  Hahaha!)

These books will be on display this spring for an open house with parents.  My students are very excited to show off all their hard work.  Hope you enjoyed taking a peek into our All About Animals unit of study!

Winter is the Warmest Season

You might not agree with me right now, but winter IS actually the warmest season.  Yep, that's right.  And if you're saying, "Uh, uh.  No way!" then you might want to read this book by Lauren Stringer and see if she might persuade you otherwise.

I absolutely love this book.  Winter is the Warmest Season shows readers that the things we do in winter are quite warm.  Things like bundling up in scarves and mittens, sitting by the fire, and drinking hot drinks.  Snuggling under blankets and spending time cuddling with family.  Convinced yet?

I use this book every year in January to kick off my opinion/persuasive writing unit of study.  At first, students are like, "No way!  Summer is the warmest!" But then I teach them that this author is going to try to convince us that winter is actually the warmest.  Afterward, we write about what makes winter warm and cozy for us.  We will be doing this on our first day back, which is a fantastic time to talk about what makes us warm because students have just spent all of winter break with family doing things that make them feel warm and cozy inside.

I highly recommend this book with its beautiful illustrations as an addition to your opinion / persuasive writing unit this year.

Stay warm friends!

The Pigeon!!!!!!!

Don't Let the Pigeon Go to School! Oh, who am I kidding? This pigeon MUST come to school with me!

Run, don't walk! Kohl's does it again with their selection of books and stuffed animals supporting Kohl's Cares. This time it's Mo Willems book characters. Oh. My. Goodness!!

I did a whole writing unit on the Pigeon books this last year with my first graders and it was a HUGE hit! My kids loved the Pigeon and I know they will love having this little guy sit in our classroom this year.

Thanks, Kohl's!

P.S. You can find other characters, too!  Elephant, Piggie, Knufflebunny... I just LOVE that Pigeon!

Yay for Pennants!

Loving how my writing center is starting to come together.  This year I moved it to a new location in my classroom.  I used to have a bulletin board in the old location, but over here I only have a boring beige wall.  (Yawn...)

So, I decided to create a bulletin board on the wall to sort of frame the space.  Today, I added a pennant and I love, love, love how it turned out.

Here's a tip for cutting pennants, and anything else really.  For 15 years I taught rubber stamping, card making, and paper crafting and this simple, little tip makes a big difference in your projects.  Tip:  Leave a white border space around your pieces.  It makes it easier to cut because you don't have to trim precisely on the edge.  The white border creates a frame and compliments the projects. 

 

These pennant banners are one of many patterns/colors available in my TPT shop.  The set includes:

-Upper and Lower Case alphabet

-Numbers 0-9

-Symbols (period, question mark, exclamation mark, hyphen, ampersand, and apostrophe)

 

With the symbols included, the possibilities are endless.  See how I used an exclamation mark on mine?



Visit my TPT shop to see more colors available in chevron and polka dot patterns.

 

 

  

Thanks for visiting!