non fiction

Hickman,Pamela

A new butterfly

Published in Canada by kids Can Press Ltd. 1997

ISBN 1-55074-202-7

This book is about Connei ,a little girl , who climbs a tree and discovers the life process of a butterfly. It is a hard cover book which has great colorful pictures and easy to understand for 3-5 year old children.

This book can be used as a wonder book because the pages are folded and it gives the story teller the opportunity to ask some wonder questions and then open the fold so that children can find their answers.

It is a repeated rhythm with short sentences which children can easily memorize and repeat or follow-up the story.

3 ways of presenting the book:
magnetic board:
I will paste book pictures on magnetic paper and have a cake pan tray which is covered with attractive paper and while i am telling the story , i demonstrate the characteristic in the book . and magnet it on the tray .
basket story :
i will have a basket of all the book  character and while reading the book , i will pull out the puppet relate to the book .
Felt board Poster:

Using felt board poster, While telling a story (I would make a big tree shape with felt and have all stages shapes of butterflies growth from egg to butterfly in detail with feltties(fabric store) and get the images from the internet or any magazine or book and copy it on felt material and cut it

3 ways of extension the book:
Project:

Parents or mentors as this book has suggested can take a caterpillar in spring or early summer, with some plants and place it in jar with a long stick and some fresh food in the jar and cover it with window screening while placing it away from direct sunlight and supply fresh food every day, after two or three weeks, chrysalis forms the butterfly will emerge, usually early in the morning after the butterfly emerges, watch how it stretches and follow the growth process to end to a beautiful butterfly . Finally free the butterfly outside in the fresh air to enjoy her life.
This will allow a child to watch closely at the butterfly process and always remember the process, while thinking and talking about it.

Mix and Match cards:

We can also make some two piece puzzles with hard cardboard which is glued with insect pictures and let children play cards and find which pieces belong to which insect (for example caterpillar relates to butterfly,… )and let the children develop their thinking abilities while they are having fun and the one who has matched more and has collected more card, is the winner, they also take turn in this game which is another way of learning.

3 possible extensions for learning.
Basket Book:
we can also borrow a basket book from the library and have lots of different book about the butterfly or catterpillar  and their stories, the library usually have a puppet in it .

Provocation:

Drawing book:

They can draw the stages of the butterfly in their own handmade notebook and draw each stage in one paper.

Skip game (outdoor game) :

Make a color chalk circle and number it as it is a caterpillar and let children skip each circle and name the numbers until they get to the head of caterpillar which is number ten.

Song:

share with children to sing about

The Butterfly song

(to the tune of "Up on the Housetop")

First comes a butterfly and lays an egg,

Out comes a caterpillar with many legs,

Oh see the caterpillar spin and spin,

A little chrysalis to sleep in.

Oh, oh ,oh wait and see

oh oh oh wait and see

Out of the chrysalis,my oh my

out comes a pretty butterfly.
                         

Jason, Cooper 1942
Barnyard Friends GEESE
The Rourke Book Co.,Inc.
ISBN :1-55916-089-6


This book is one of the Barnyard friends book series which help children learn about the different animals (Farm Cats, Farm Dogs, Goats, Rabbits, turkeys) life and how they grow, work and play on the farm.
This special book is about the geese, where they live and how they look like. This book is for 3-5 years old and the reason i chosed it is because  it is hardcover book and small and have clear and big picturesalso having series of them will provoke childeren to read other series books .Also they see geese around parks around so  children will also become familiarized with the way of geese  are raised and act and uses, their breed, and the difference between wild and baby geese.
The more children get to know about nature and the animals which they live with, the more friendly they can be and know how to treat them. BC geese are very famous and they are shown in different parts of BC. We also can find them in Amble-side park or Stanley park .
Presenting the book :
Puppet:
Make a goose puppet and let the goose talk, when it is circle time, and read the story in behalf of the goose (it is better to change to voice) .


Mat play:
place a blue (as a sky, lake) or green (as a farm) piece of a mat and while reading the book , when it comes to the geese life and where they live , they can move to the mat that is noticed in the book to represent farm ,sky,lake.
wondering reading :
while reading the book you can ask lots of wondering question before you go to the other page , like i wonder where geese live and then on the next page you can show the picture to them  

Extentions:
Field trip :Art work :

Take children to one of the lakes(ambelside park or stanley park) and let the children feed the geese some bread and walk among them and take photos with them, this trip also can follow by having discussion about the geese .



Give children some cut colored construction paper and have different colors of feathers and let them glue them and cover them with the feathers, then they can either paint and glue it on a big paper (blue, green) which represents flying in the sky, walking in a farm and swimming in a lake for children to improve their understanding to know more about the geese or hang it from the ceiling.


Craft:
Kids' craft: Learn how to make these cute chirpy chicks, from the internet.
Make a fuzzy baby goose :
You need
• Yarn in desired colour
• Pipe cleaner (for the legs)
• Bottle cap(for the hat)
• Card stock
• Googly eyes
• Felt scraps
• Beads, buttons, ribbon or other decorations as desired
• Compass, pencil, scissors, craft glue, markers
• Tapestry needle

Robbins, Ken (1992)
Make Me a peanut butter sandwich (and a glass of milk)

Published by Scholastic Inc.

ISBN 0-590-43550-7

This is a non-fiction book about how to make peanut butter sandwich . It is distinctive –hand tinted photograph and a detail described book about the peanut growth process, from windrows to roasting peanuts and finally grinding and putting them in a jar to be a delicious snack. The reason I have chosen this book is I know peanut butter is one of the most favorite snacks for children and a healthy nutrition  so  knowing about the making process is interesting for them.

Presenting the book:

.Read the book to them and have some wondering questions and pages ready while reading the book /

.have some felt pieces cut from the book picture ready in a basket and while you are reading the story you can show them to the children.

.Have some cut  cardboard of the book pictures on the wall and while reading the book let children tell you which cardboard is related to what you are reading.

Extention:

Snack time:

Bring peanut butter and let children have their snack with toasted bread and have discussion about it.

Library:

take children to library and help them to grab some appropriate book about peanut butter and let them look at it and ask questions if they want.

DVD:

we can also bring dvd at home or in the daycare center which shows peanut butter factories and how they make it. When they obsereve it they remember the process more .

Provocation:

Art:

Let them color peanut butter shell with different kind of paint and have some art experience, they can also glue them on a piece of colored construction paper to make a beautiful art masterpiece.

Sound:

Have children experience different sound and different music notes by putting peanuts seeds, the peanuts shell in a shaker and shake it to see how the sounds are.

Discovering :

Let them have a peanut shell and try to bring the seed out and eat it, then they had experience about peanut by opening the shell and finding the seed and tasting them while they are feeling the hard shell and having the soft seed inside.

*Note: this would only apply to a center that is allowed peanuts. 

Kendell, Patricia (2003) Grizzly Bears,

Published by Raintree Steck-Vaughn 

ISBN: 073985499-2

 This book describes different types of bears, how bears take care of their young, where they live and how they feed them.  Also how the mother bear has instincts to protect their babies when danger is around. It explains their  hibernation and how to be safe around bears.  It is perfect for a 3-5 year old in that it tells you everything you need to know about bears in the wild and has many pictures to show the child what bears are like and where they live.  There are great pictures of them  in their environment, illustrates their cubs and how they act, also how they live and where they build their homes.  It invokes children to want to learn more about bears, gives a mystery mood for the children in that you usually only see bears in the wild so teaching them about bears could be something fun and exciting.

    

Provocations:

    

       -You could start off by making drawn and laminated  bear paws and place them  on the ground  from their cubbyholes to the mat ( for circle time)  It could get the children all excited on what animal has left their foot prints in their classroom. 

      - There could be a life size poster of a bear so the children can see how big and tall a bear is and can compare themselves to it. 

       -   You could set up a station using a BIG cardboard box with cut off wings, and call it the hibernation station. Explaining how bears feed off the fat in their body  to sleep the entire winter.  Inside you candraw sticks, rocks, and leaves showing that they sleep underground.

Three ways to tell the story:

story in a basket-  Using story in a basket you could provide many more props then just stuffed bears, inside you can have a felt river with felt fish ( salmon) showing what types of food the bears eat. Since bears also hunt, you could have beanie babies or stuffed animals such as  deer, moose or rabbits to show what kind of animals they hunt.  Using a circle cut out of brown felt and a brown blanket ( the same size ) you could describe where the bears go to sleep during the winter. When bears wake up they are very hungry and generally pose a threat to humans by going through our garbage's. You could use a see through plastic cup with crumpled up paper to resemble a garbage. 

Felt story-

    Using  felt, you can pretty much make anything you need. In this case you would need to cut out 3 or 4 bears ( a family ), a strip of blue felt resembling a river, some trees, some fish ( salmon) , a few animals from the wild ( deer,  moose, and rabbits), a brown circle for where they sleep in the winter, felt humans and felt garbage.

Chunk the book-

 In this book there is a page with the table of contents.  You could start to chunk the book from ....

"WHERE THE GRIZZLY BEARS LIVE" 

   talk to children about where they live.

                      then... 

" BABY GRIZZLY BEARS"

"LOOKING AFTER THE CUBS"

"GROWING UP"

      talk to the children about how many bear cubs do they think a bear mother has.

          then...

"LEAVING HOME"

"FOOD"

"HUNTING"

"MEETING OTHER BEARS"

ask the children how far they think a bear travels from its home.

      then..

" THE WINTER SLEEP"

"WAKING UP"

     you could talk to the children about what they think the bear does when it wakes up. 

        then....

"THREATS"

"DANGERS"

"HELPING BEARS TO SURVIVE"

 ask the children what we can do to stay safe from bears.

Extensions:

  -You could take the children on a field trip to a  river so they can see where a bear goes to catch salmon, and let them explore the environment like a bear does. 

 - Take the children on a nature walk to see if they can find any bear prints.

 - You could go on the internet and type in www.supercoloring.com and look down the list for "bears" 

    The children can color their own bears as an art activity.

Lindeen, Carol (2005) Dolphins,
Published by Capstone Press, Minnesota

ISBN: 0-7368-2599-1

   Looking through this book you feel as if you are riding the waves just like the dolphins.  Explore the

wonders of everything a dolphin does in their own habitat.  It is a quick and easy book to read, not very

challenging, is a great fun book for all ages. With true facts and great photos.   Perfect for 3-5 year old's in that there are short sentences and easy to read. There is also a glossary in the back just in case you don't understand what some of the words mean.   The photos are full of underwater colors and great snap shots of the dolphins themselves.  The vibrant blue colors caught my attention before I even opened the book.

      To provide back round knowledge on this book you could put up posters around the room before you read the book, and get the children to bring sea animals to the classroom so they could get a feeling of being under the water.

Three different ways to tell the story:


    Felt story- Using felt you could make an under water board for underwater sea creatures and provide felt dolphins and their homes to tell this story.

Chunk the story- This story is chunked into 4 different sections already.  It has a table of contents in the beginning which have ...

    DOLPHINS

    SWIMMING

    HUNTING

    UNDER THE SEA

 You could stop at each section and ask what they think about that section and maybe see what they think will happen next with what they already know about dolphins in the water.

Puppets-

    Using Dolphin puppets you could tell this story.

Extensions-

   Take a field trip to the Vancouver Aquarium and watch the dolphin show so the children could see a real live dolphin and see how they move in the water.

  Go to www.dolphinkind.com  and there are many activities you can use with the children such as dolphin coloring pages, dolphin connect the dots, dolphin crossword puzzles ( depending on the age group)

   Children could make their own little dolphins with plasticine from the pictures they see around the room.

   You could watch the movie,"FLIPPER" about a young boy who lives in Florida keys, and becomes friends with a injured wild dolphin and they become inseparable and go on many adventures together. Great movie for children all ages.

Pfeffer, Wendy (1994) From Tadpole To Frog, Harper Collins Publishers, New York

ISBN : 0-06-445123-2

    In this book it shows you how frogs grow up from a tadpole to a beautiful frog. With lots of facts about frogs you learn the different stages a frog goes through in its life. As it hatches it becomes a tadpole and swims in the pond freely.  Then it grows a tiny fish tail and small legs. Gradually this tadpole gets fully developed into a frog.  When reading this book the pictures are very exact to what a frog looks like in all of the stages in its habitat.  It is great for 3-5 year old because it is short and fun.  Any child who is interested in amphibians will enjoy this book not only for its true facts but also for the great illustrations.  Every picture is full of color and gives you an under the water mood.

Provocations:

  To build back round knowledge on this book you could go to the pond with your class and catch some tadpoles and watch them grow in your class and then release them when they are old enough.   Also you could get a short video on frogs and their different stages.   You could go to the Vancouver Aquarium  in the frog section and find more fun facts that you couldn't maybe find out about through books and view live frogs.

Three ways to tell the story:

Felt story-

Using a felt story you could make the felt frogs in their different stages as you are reading the book, so the children would see how a frog grows visually.

Story in a basket- 

Telling the story in the basket you could find stuffed frogs or plastic frogs from either the aquarium that are life size so the children could see how big or small they really are.

Participation- When you are reading this story you could have all ready made tadpole masks. Each stage- Tadpole with tail, Tadpole with tail and 2 legs, Tadpole with short tail and 4 legs, and a frog. Children could take turns in being the different stages and " swim" over as they are called.

 Extensions: You could sing "The Frog Song" =

  "Here the lively song of the frogs in yonder pond....

     CRICK, CRICK, CRICKETY CRICK,

     BURRRRRR UP! "    

This song is lots of fun for children and you could sing it in rounds also.

•  You could read the book, "Frog and Toad" by Arnold Lobel
•  You could watch the movie, " The Frog Prince"  that you can find in any movie store or your local library.

   Frog art... Learn about different types of frogs and get the children the draw their own frog and place them around the classroom.