Penguins - Week 3!

Penguin Books

This week students wrapped up their penguin books and made a Table of Contents to help their books truly be complete. Students have been working on these books for three weeks now and they are truly incredible! 

One of the writing lessons from this week that I want to highlight for you is our Penguin Heights lesson. On Day 1 we simply read about heights of penguins and then wrote and/or drew about what we learned. 

However, on Day 2 students were able to compare themselves to life-size penguin pictures hanging in our classroom! For this lesson students were able to stand next to each of four different types of penguins, compare their height, and then answer two questions: Who is taller? How much taller? These are questions students have been required to do during Unit 5 in math as well, so it helped to reinforce math skills while also being a great visual for understanding the height of various penguin species.

Finished Penguin Books - SHARE!

To celebrate completing our books we had a share session on Friday. Students got to sit down with each other's books, read through them, and offer some positive comments about the writing and/or illustrations! Another way we celebrated (continuing into next week) is by having students visit some Kindergarten classrooms to share their finished Informational Books with some younger students! This has been an empowering experience so far for both the K students as well as the 1st graders, as both groups learn what it truly means to write a teaching book, or an informational book. The first graders are getting to see how much their books really do teach to an audience, rather than just reading them to each other or to me. They also get a chance to be the "expert" on the topic by answering questions from the Kindergarten students and to use "teaching voices" while sharing with confidence!

Penguin Huddle/Penguin Waddling

This week we also learned about how penguins walk and a bit more about how they stay warm. First, we watched a video of a penguin huddle that demonstrates how penguins group themselves together in the strong, cold wind...then slowly shuffle, each taking their turn on the outside edges of the group. We tried this out using slow, waddling, movements. Then it was time to review that father penguins do this while caring for an unhatched chick while the mother penguin is away feeding at the sea. They must hold the egg on their feet, keep it warm by settling it under their brood pouch, and still shuffle with the group of penguins. So the next logical activity...practice walking with our own unhatched chicks on our feet. What a fun, challenging, learning experience. Here is a series of photos from the lesson: