Week 8: Zoo Animals and a Fieldtrip

 I've learned when it comes to preschool, not all themes are created equal. The zoo animal theme we did last week was one of the good ones! There are dozens of great kids books about animals, safaris, etc. My mom sent me lots of fun math and writing worksheets, and gave me some treat activity ideas. Here's a few of the best:

Animal tangram patterns compliments of the Dollar Tree. Love that place!

 We read a book about watering holes in Africa, then made this watering hole snack. Blue tinted vanilla pudding and animal crackers. He's never been so excited about playing with his food.

 Paper plate animal art. He made a zebra, lion, and giraffe, but I failed to get a picture of the giraffe. A little paint, construction paper, googly eyes, and paper plates. Pretty darn cute!

 Monkey face sandwich! I'm always amazed how much better my kids eat if their lunch is shaped in something fun. This was made using a peanut butter/bread face, straight pretzel mouth, raisin eyes and nose, and a cookie cut in half for the ears.

 

For phonics, we worked with the letter z. He made a large z letter shape and decorated it with zebra stripes and zebra stickers. We also discussed what animals need to live, He used animal stickers to fill the cages on a paper, then colored in what each animal needs. Drawing is definitely not Hinder's favorite thing. 

  

We continued the same discussion the next day. I drew large vertical lines on a zip lock with a permanent marker. That was the cage, and I put an animal cut out in the cage. Hinder had to draw with colored expo markers what would go in the cage for each animal. I.e. The alligator needed a pool, giraffe would need trees, etc. The best part was that he could wipe off the expo and use the same Ziploc for multiple animals.

 Hinder enjoyed making a play zoo from linkin logs and the clay left over from week 7. He was pretty creative and added some rocks and toys for the elephant to play with. He even made little people to patronize the zoo.

 

 Of course, in the end, the tiger escaped and massacred all the zoo-goers. 

Boys....
 

 As our culminating activity at the end of the week, we took the kids to a little zoo about 45 minutes away from us in York, ME.
It was quaint and had enough large animals to keep the kids excited.

 

 There was several different 'petting zoo' type exhibits. Hinder was all about it! He touched everything he could.

 

  

 Vyla was all less enthused about the idea....

 

She would barely come out from between Riley's legs to get a look at the goats.

 I guess she takes after her mama. I didn't even venture into that goat pen. No thanks!

 I prefer my animal encounters to be less up-close-and-personal.