Aug. 21, 2005
Insects/Spiders Unit Study
Posted in September Unit Studies
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Another preschool unit
study. A lot of these ideas I got off of a very well done insect
unit study I found online. I printed it off a few months ago - I
can't find the site again, either. If I come across it, I'll post
it. I hope I can find it - it was great - color coded and
everything. Some tips from doing this one: Don't use Elmer's glue for the ladybug necklace. It's too easy to rip the felt out of the caps. If you're going to do the paper mache insects, it is a week long project. Fun, but a long project. And you'll need to use sturdy glue to glue them together. I also used toothpicks in between each section to hold it together better. For the bingo cards I made, I made them 1 inch by 1 inch. I should have done 2 inches square instead. And the puff paint spider web wasn't that cool. The puff paint bottle was hard for the kids to squeeze, and when it was all done....it was cool to touch since it was dimensional, but the paper was flat. I had been picturing the paper a bit more dimensional along the folds, but it wasn't. So nothing spectacular there LOL. Reading I Know an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Fly Little Miss Muffet Eric Carle insect books Bugs and other insects / Bobbie Kalman & Tammy Everts J 595.7 K Dangerous insects / Missy Allen, Michel Peissel J 595.7065 A How insects work together / Jill Bailey J 595.7156 B Insects / Anna Claybourne J 595.7 CLA Insects, bugs, & art activities / Steve Parker & Polly Goodman J 595.7 PAR Spiders, centipedes, and millipedes / Sally Morgan J 595.44 M Spider's lunch : all about garden spiders / Joanna Cole J 595.44 C Math Tarantula's Bananas Duplicate tarantulas and bananas. Color, laminate and cut out. Have her match the number on each tarantula to the correct group of bananas. Ladybug Game Duplicate 5 copies of ladybugs, and number 1-15. Color, laminate, cut out. Have her look at the number on the back of each ladybug, and then place the correct number of black beans on the back of each ladybug. Give the kids each a magnifying glass and a notebook. Go outside/on a walk and mark down how many bugs they find. When we come back inside, make a graph of the kinds and amounts of bugs they found. Do the activity cards with Busy Bugs Practice adding with rubber bugs. Draw a map of our neighborhood. Take a bug and figure out how to get from one place to another, following the roads. Science Identify body parts of insects Learn about metamorphosis Learn about the types of insects: decomposers garden helpers edible insects pollinator herbivore carnivore Fruit Flies Take a ripe piece of fruit and place it in an open glass jar. Put it near an open window for a couple days. Place a cap on the jar and leave it in a warm area. Watch what happens to the fruit. (In a few days, fruit flies should emerge - gag) Listen to sounds of insects on the computer/by cd Food/Cooking Make curds and whey - either the real way by making homemade yogurt, or heat 2 cups whole milk until just boiling. Remove from heat and add a tablespoon of vinegar and stir. Buzzy Bees Fill a drinking cup with juice (nectar). Make large paper flowers and tape them to a drinking cup. Put a straw in the glass (so it comes out the center of the flower). Drink the nectar from the flower like a bee or butterfly would. Ants on a Log Fill a celery stick with peanut butter, and put raisins on top. Bug Mountain Cake Bake a dome cake and a rectangle cake. Place dome cake on top of the rectangle cake - frost with chocolate frosting. Cover with 2-3 cups of crushed chocolate cookies. Arrange rubber bugs on top of cake, crawling down the mountain. Crafts stamp with my insect rubber stamps Make a spider web - fold a piece of black paper in half lengthwise, widthwise, and diaganolly. Open up and lay flat. Trace with white puff paint over the fold lines. Make a spiral circle over that with the paint, let dry. Ladybug necklace - Paint backs of 2 bottle caps red. Draw black dots on one of them. Glue a strip of black felt to the insides of both, to make a hinge. Glue a photo inside. Put yarn around the hinge for a necklace. (this will make more sense when we make it and I post a photo) Paper Mache Insects ( dh and I think this is the coolest project....I have a feeling we're going to have a lot of big insects around the house LOL) Blow up balloons and tape them together to make body shapes. Tear newspaper into strips about 2 inches wide, and dip them into a 50/50 flour and water mix. Cover the balloons with the newspaper strips - let dry for an hour or so inbetween layers. The more layers, the sturdier the insect. When you are all done, let dry for a couple of days. Pop the balloon with a needle. Paint the insect, and attach pipe cleaners for antennae, and whatever else you want for eyes, wings, etc... Make a Tarantula Cut out a spider body and attach pipe cleaner legs. Make it lifesize - 10 inches across, legs extended. Queen Wasp Chamber Paint 9 toilet paper tubes brown, and glue in a pyramid shape. Glue one grain of rice in each tube. Make a wasp out of yellow clay - use pipe cleaners for legs and antennae. Draw on details with black marker. Place wasp in one of the chambers. Jumping Grasshopper Cut out a 3 cup section of a cardboard egg carton. Paint the outside green. Put a rubber ball in the middle cup, pushing a straight pin through each side to hold it in. Cut out legs and wings from green construction paper, and glue to the sides and top. Add eyes. Music  Ants go Marching 1x1 (I hate this song  )I Caught a Baby Bumble Bee Listen to Flight of the Bumblebee Bible Verses Prov 6:6, 30:24, 25, 27 Exodus 8:20-32, 10:1-20, Joel 1:2-4 Psalms 105:31 Misc. Activities Go on a scavenger hunt. Give them a list of insects (use pictures or stickers for the list), and as they find them, mark them off. Grasshopper Jump - make an obstacle course of things for them to jump over. Relay Race - Have them race each other, doing things like the caterpillar/inchworm crawl, grasshopper hop, etc. Bingo Make a 5x5 card, with images of insects or numbers on the squares. Either call out the name of an insect and she has to find it and put a marker on it, or ask a question with a numerical answer, and she has to find the number and put a marker on it. Ex - How many legs does an insect have? Or have a pile with matching pictures, and flip over the pile, one by one and find the matching image - first with 5 in a row wins. Links: Insect Worksheets Lots of Insect Coloring Sheets Itsy Bitsy Spider craft ideas Awesome Insect clip art Books I used: Crafts for Kids who are Wild about Insects - Kathy Ross |
Comments
Aug. 22, 2005 - Hi!
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Posted by Aug. 22, 2005 - Fun Unit Studies!
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Aug. 22, 2005 - I am going to have to try...
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