Penguins!

Rachel, I emailed you a copy of St. Patty's Pack O'Fun! Barlo, you were my first to comment, but I do not have your email! Please leave a comment with your email and I will get you a copy of your choice :)

The hubs and I went to Dallas this weekend for his company's year end party at the Gaylord Texan! It was a fun time! We also got to hit up H&M and Ikea! Woo! I am exhausted and will probably go to bed when I finish this post!! Here is a peek into our Penguin week!

We had a snow/ice day Thursday {and it looks like we may be getting another "winter storm" this week??!!?}. It was a welcomed surprise! My house is pretty clean now, so that's a plus!! Since we were out a day, we had to cut out a few activities of our penguin unit, including our penguin measurement and story problems :( But we just didn't have all the materials ready or the time to squeeze them in Friday. We still had a week jam-packed with learning!

We started our unit comparing Cinderella with Cinderella Penguin. Amy did an awesome job! We made a venn diagram as a class, then the kids also had to write which book they liked best and support their choice with 3 reasons. Amy's book won! More kids liked Cinderella than Cinderella Penguin :)

 

Throughout the week, we read LOTS of nonfiction books about penguins and the kids were soooo into it! Here are my favorite nonfiction books to read to them...

 

 

We worked on fact and opinion a lot and made these anchor charts. Then the kids did some fact and opinion writing {along with a quick little craftivity!}.

 

{Photo circa 2011 :)}

 

 



Throughout the week, we focused on the following penguin vocab: rookery, brood pouch, creche, tobogganing, waddling, molting, porpoising, krill, and regurgitate. We had the kids infer what they thought regurgitate means. We gave them this sentence first: "Penguins regurgitate." They had to write what they thought it meant on a notecard. They were quick to tell us that it was hard to infer the meaning without clues :) Then we read their responses. Next, we gave them this sentence: "Penguins regurgitate their food." They were able to make better inferences. Then we found the meaning in one of our books! Needless to say, they were grossed out :) We made these vocabulary penguins to show our learning!

 

{Photos circa 2011 :)}

 

We ended our week making our Penguin Fact Books {from my Penguin Packet}. They each had to write at least 5 facts that they learned. 

 

 

You can get your penguin fact books and MANY more activities in my Penguins! ELA and Math Activities pack! Click the picture below :)

 

 

This was definitely a high interest unit, and the kids were really excited! I soooo wish we could have gotten to all of our activities, but we will be VERY busy celebrating Dr. Seuss this upcoming week! :)

 

Off to bed I go! Goodnight, friends!