Week 10 Day 5

Book choices for today:

Vertebrates   Ted O’Hare
Animal School What Class are You?   Michael Lord
Arctic Tundra   Donald Silver
Arctic Tundra   Michael Forman

Zoology: (first circle)

Need for lesson – A set of vertebrate group cards.

Zoology 14
We have learned that these animals belong to the vertebrate group of animals. Why do they all belong here? There are so many of these animals that they have been put into different groups. Tell me the name of this group that a horse belongs to. What about the frog? This turtle is part of which group? The last two are the fish and birds.
We talked about three groups so far. Mammals is one of them. How are baby mammals born? All mammals drink what after they are born? Another way we know something is a mammal is because all mammals have________on their bodies.
Fish is another group of vertebrates that we talked about. A fish body has a special shape. Can you remember what it is called? Do fish lay eggs or are babies born from the mother’s body? What about all those fins: the dorsal fin, caudal fin, tail fin, what do they help fish to do? And how do fish breathe again?
The last group we talked about so far are the amphibians. Amphibians have to go through a change after they hatch from eggs. It is called? Amphibians are cold-blooded. Cold-blooded means what again? Which groups are left that we will next talk about?

Geography: (second circle)

Need for lesson – Pictures of a Tundra Biome (Creative Teaching Press) or other Arctic work to have a review.

Remind the children how we talked about the Arctic area recently. Now discuss how this area is called a Tundra. The Arctic Tundra is dry, very windy, and cold all year. The Arctic Tundra has ground that is permanently frozen. This is called permafrost. Animals cannot dig underground and hibernate because of the permafrost. This habitat also doesn’t have any trees. The plants that are able to grow in the Tundra are small, grow close together, and close to the ground. You can also talk about the animals that live there and add coloring page or art idea to enhance the Arctic Tundra. (Talk about the Inuit People from the previous lesson and follow up with the story, An Inuksusk Meands Welcome, by Mary Wallace or any other book you would like to enhance this lesson)