Penguin Studies!

This past month we've been working hard studying penguins. We started the unit with a KWL (what you KNOW, what you WANT to learn, & what you LEARNED) chart.

From there, we took a look at the table of contents from our non-fiction penguin book. We each brainstormed a "why" and "how" question relating to the topics from the book. 

From this book, we learned a great deal of penguin facts! As we read we took notes about specific kinds of penguins. 

Then it was time to draw a penguin question from the hat! 

We had to use our penguin book to find supporting facts to answer the question we drew. You'll see we learned the importance of highlighting useable facts, but we also learned we can't copy the author's wards as our own because that's called plagiarism. 

We learned how to write a different kind of paragraph--a "SEE" (statement, example, explanation) paragraph. To get the students excited about it, Mrs. Kasper wore some crazy glasses to teach the lesson. 

We learned how to rearrange words to change a question into a statement. Then we added specific examples to support that statement. Finally, the paragraph had further explanation to discuss the cause/effect relationship. 

At last, it was time to type up the rough draft in the computer lab! 

Mrs. Kasper then helped each student edit their writing before the paragraphs we're published for the hallway & we're mounted under our penguin art! 

Here's the process of our penguin art project: 

While studying penguins we also did some hands-on experiments. We formed a human rookery outside with no coats. 

We also did a blubber experiment using shortening & ice water. 

We also put vasoline on our fingers to see how penguins' oily feather repel water. 

We also got to see how hard it is (for us) to hold a nerf football (penguin egg) on our feet. 

To review everything we had learned we took a field trip across the street to the public library for a snowball (paper) fight. Then, we opened the snowballs & answered the penguin questions as a class. Thanks to Mrs. Sippel for the fun review lesson! 

At the end I the unit, one of our wonderful room mothers brought in the ingredients to assemble an adorable penguin treat! 

During the unit Mrs. Kasper also read aloud 2 penguin chapter books. A Magic Treehouse book: Eve of the Emperor Penguin & a Ready, Freddy book: The Penguin Problem. 

We also had a surprise visitor during our unit! Check out the "Polly the Penguin" post! 

We had SO much fun learning all about penguins in January!