Animal Characteristics (Vertebrates) Learning Pack

Introducing our Animal Characteristics (Vertebrate) Pack with tons of activity sets that will suite your young students' needs.  This learning material is more than just sorting or matching activities.  What we have in this learning pack are realistic illustrations of each characteristics for better retention of concepts and tons of hands-on learning opportunities for young students to work on.  This Montessori Vertebrate Characteristics learning pack was basically designed for children ages 5 years and older.

With this learning material, your students will be able to learn the characteristics of amphibians, mammals, reptiles, fish, and birds through visual representation and hands-on activities.  There are 8 characteristics provided for each animal for you to explore.

Animal Kingdom 3 Part Cards and Charts

I am so excited to share these beautiful learning materials I created for my boys.  Mavi, my 9 year old is currently the one using this for school, but Vito ended up using some of the activities as he loves to work on his older brother’s materials too.  So this is our Animal Kingdom Cards and Charts set.  The main objective of this material is to introduce the different classifications/groups of animals to your child.  We have an older version of this, and you can check it out here (Kingdoms of Life: Animal Kingdom) if you are interested.  Anyway, allow me to discuss some of the highlights of this learning material below, so you can have a better idea of what you will be getting when you purchase this for your child or your school.

A Walkthrough of Animal Study for Preschoolers

This coming spring, I will be introducing the zoology album of Montessori early childhood to Vito.  We did a couple of animal study last year but it was mainly for introduction and familiarization.  This year, our homeschool activities will be in line with the album I bought from Montessori Parent.  Of course, I will not follow the album word by word as I try not to replicate the Montessori classroom in our home and I don’t possess other classroom materials.  But it will still be spontaneous and hands-on.  In this post I will talk about the album, the materials I prepared, and my plans on how we are going to approach the “hands-on” aspect of the study.

Montessori Inspired Animal Classification Activities

There’s nothing more interesting for my three years old than learning about animals.  Aside from learning about the continents they live in, my boys also love to identify animals according to their names and classifications.  Initially, Vito can only tell the difference between birds and fish, the rest he calls them “animals”.  So I decided to expand this knowledge further by introducing the other three classifications: mammals, reptiles and amphibians.

Montessori Inspired Shark Study for Kids

My 8 year old Mavi is into sharks nowadays and asked if we can do a study about them. The last time we had a shark study was years ago, when he was 4 years old and this time he wanted to use our Shark Anatomy Model which he recently bought. This is Vito’s very first shark activity and he had so much fun learning with his big brother.

Plants versus Animals Sorting Activity

I am so thankful for The Helpful Garden for providing us this printable (saved me a lot of time!).  Of all the plant and animal activities that we have done in the past, I have forgotten this one basic activity for Montessori botany and zoology: identifying plant and animals. 

Introducing Toddlers to Animals in Land, Water and Air

I had two presentations for the land, water, and air animals.  I first showed Vito what’s land, water, and air animals.  We worked with action songs to demonstrate how animals move in land, water, and air.  After I presented the pictures and the trays, Vito sorted out the animal figures I prepared for him.

Animals and their Covers

My boys love animal covers!  We used this whenever we want to play around with or beautiful animals from Schleich or whenever Mavi wants to replicate them through drawing.

The Animal Kingdom Revisited

No school for Mavi means brainstorming for future activities. He opened up lately that he wanted to study about animals again, so I took out our cards on The Animal Kingdom and checked what else we missed and haven’t explored yet.  He reviewed the cards and sorted out the things that he wanted to learn this year.  He picked arthropods, starfish and jellyfish! Yay, something new!

Learning about Reptiles: Snakes

If you are in the UK or Ireland, you must have heard of Steve Backshall and his animal shows like the Deadly 60.  Mavi is obsessed with Steve, due to his witty and pleasant hosting of the show. You can learn about it here.  Now, going back, he’s been featuring reptiles lately, mostly how dinosaurs evolved into crocodiles, birds,  snakes etc. 

What are Reptiles?  We learned from our previous study of the Vertebrate animals that REPTILES have a covering of bony plates or scales.  They vary in sizes and shapes and include forms like snakes, alligators, crocodiles, turtles and lizards.  Reptiles make their homes in great variety of places .

In this post, I will be focusing on snakes, as Mavi and I had a brief discussion about them a few days ago.  This is the book we’ve got of Steve Backshall and we used it as a reference.  We had a few snake figures from Safari Ltd Reptiles TOOB .

Books.  These are the books of Steve Backshall we borrowed from the library.  Youcan check them out here:Steve Backshall's Deadly 60  

Characteristics of Snakes (things we learned):

Snakes’ coverings are dry with perfectly dry scales, they are not slimy.

A snake’s tongue is a sense organ, just like an insect’s antennae.  Therefore, when a snake thrusts its tongue, it is simply trying to find out about its surroundings and what is going on.

They are the only creatures that can swallow objects larger than themselves.  This is because they have elastic body walls.

Snakes have an extra bone hinging the upper to the lower jaw, which allows them to spread widely when swallowing an object.

The noiseless and graceful movement of the snake is brought about by the crosswise plates of the snake’s body that is connected to the ends of its ribs.

Life Cycle of a Snake

This life cycle material is for FREE and you can download it from my SCIENCE PRINTABLE PAGE.

So we looked into the process of how snakes give birth.  We also learned that NOT ALL SNAKES GIVE BIRTH BY PRODUCING EGGS. ANACONDAs give birth to their young!

Snakes Around the World

So I gathered a list of snakes and we looked at them over the internet.  I didn’t produce any printable file as the images are all copyrighted.  But I provided the link below on where you can find them, and see how they look like or learn about their habitats.

• Ribbon Snake [wiki]
• Coral Snake [wiki]
• Rubber Boa  [link]
• Rough Green Snake  [link]
• Timber Rattler  [link]
• Desert Gopher Snake [link]
• Ring Necked Snake [link]
• Sidewinder or Horned Rattlesnake  [link]
• Pike Headed Tree Snake  [link]
• Pilot Black Snake [link]
• Copperhead Snake [link]
• Southern Hognose Snake [link]
• California Lyre Snake [link]
• Water Moccasin [link]
• Gray Pilot Snake [link]

You might also be interested in these amazing Snake Units:

Investigating Animal Tracks and {Learn & Play Link Up}

** contains affiliated links **

We are continuing on our study of animal identification and learning more about their characteristics.  After watching Deadly 60 series of Steve Backshall, we discovered that you can also identify animals by the tracks they make!   So we used our favourite Schleich animal figures to test this.  We randomly dipped the animals in the black paint and freely made tracks. Vito’s helping as well!

The tracks and trails an animal leaves can tell us the type of animals it is and whether it was walking or running, and you can also tell if it was by itself or with a group of other animals.

Footprints of animals are very tricky to identify unlike that of humans! But by thorough investigation, you can tell if the animal is hoofed or with paws or toes.  To learn about the footprints of these animals, one must have a proper observation for these unique characteristics.

Animal tracks to note:

• Did the animals walk on 2 or 4 feet?
• Does the animal left a large or small track?
• Was it walking or running?
• Was it just one animal or followed by another?

Using our printable and the actual tracks, Mavi grouped the animals according to the characteristics of their footprints:

• Raccoon and bear have 4 toes front and 5 toes rear, they have claws.
• Dog, fox and wolf have 4 toes front, 5 toes rear and produces an egg shaped track
• Lion, lynx produces a round track with claws, 4 toes front and 5 toes rear
• Deer, elk have heart shaped tracks and has 4 toes front and 5 toes rear

And the highlight of this lesson is for them to see how their footprints look like!

Materials Used: 

Thank you for taking time to read this post!  You might as well visit our Zoo Animal Tracks post for another activity that involves playdough. It’s a not as messy as black paint

Don’t forget to PIN for later!

Welcome to the Learn & Play Link Party!

Here are the featured animal-themed activities for this week!

 

 

Learning About Caves from Natural Beach Living

H is for Hibernate from In Our Pond

Squirrel Activities for Tots from Every Star Is Different

DIY Montessori-Inspired Sensory Habitats from Mama’s Happy Hive

 

Now it’s time for this week’s link party! This is a BRAND new link up for all blog posts that include learn and play activities and hands-on education for kids. We are excited to read your blog posts and to see what you have to share! Please link up below and grab our button to display on your blog.

If you are a blogger, share your family friendly posts here. We are looking for things which include:

• Montessori Education
• Homeschool
• Sensory Play
• Tot and Preschool Trays
• Fine and Gross Motor Activities
• Kids in the Kitchen
• Healthy Recipes for Kids
• Arts and Crafts
• Natural Living
• Free Educational Printables
• Family-Oriented Activities
• Healthy Living

Your post will be featured on each of our blogs where we will pick our favourite posts every other week. That means there is more of a chance that you will be featured!

Everyone, please meet our link party hosts:

Christian Montessori Blog ~ Please visit our CMN FB group ~ Pinterest

Vanessa from Mama’s Happy Hive~FB~Pinterest~Instagram~Twitter

Jennifer from Study at Home Mama~FB~Pinterest~Instagram~Twitter

Marie from Child Led Life~FB~Pinterest~Instagram~Twitter

Jae from Pinay Homeschooler~FB~Pinterest~Instagram~Twitter

Heather from Golden Reflections Blog~FB~Pinterest~Instagram~Twitter

Renae from Every Star is Different~FB~Pinterest

GUIDELINES FOR LINKING

• Please link up 1-3 posts
• Follow each of the hosts on social media
• When you link up, please add our button and place it at the bottom of your shared posts or link back with text link.
• By entering a link, you’re giving us permission to feature an image on our blogs. Proper credit & links will ALWAYS be given.
• Please visit a couple of shared posts and leave a comment for them
• Remember that you must link back in order to be featured

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An InLinkz Link-up

Classifying Vertebrate Animals

** Contains affiliate links **

I love unplanned activities.  Mavi would always resort to this activity whenever he’s bored on Fridays (swimming lessons were moved to Saturdays).  I like that he can do this activity independently, while learning the important characters of animals that belong in each group.

I believe that it is important for the child to have a clear and defined idea of the classes in the animal kingdom and its division.  What’s important to me is to have him gain the knowledge through this activity rather than reading and memorizing the difference in the books.

The Annelids: Earthworms and {Learn & Play Link Up}

Lately, we've been noticing a lot of worms in the yard. I have to admit, I've never been a fan of them! In fact, I'm terrified of worms. However, the boys seem to find these creatures quite amusing. While we were observing them in the garden, I decided to bring out the earthworm life cycle figures that my Aunt had brought when she visited.

Before learning about the life cycle of worms, Mavi and I researched earthworms on the internet. Here are some fascinating facts we found about worms!

1. There are 6,000 species of worms worldwide.

2. Worms breathe through their skin as they have no lungs.

3. They are hermaphrodites, meaning they are both male and female and can produce sperm and eggs.

4. Worms need water to survive. If their skin dries out, they will die.

5. Earthworms are made up of mostly water, about 90%.

I also created similar learning materials for my Animal Life Cycle resources. I find this approach helpful as Mavi can retain a lot of information by presenting the life cycle this way.

You can download a copy of the Worm Life Cycle here.

Because I can’t take earthworms indoors or conduct hands-on learning on earthworm anatomy, we used our worm figure instead to examine the parts of an earthworm. Click here for a copy of the Worm Nomenclature Cards.

Because I wanted to integrate Vito into our activities, we made some wormy meal (unhealthy!). I made Vito hammer a few Oreo cookies… and use them as soil.

Then we added some wormy jellies for everyone to feast on!

Welcome to the Learn & Play Link Party!

For this week, I’d like to feature amazing printables that I’d like to try for my kids!  These are created by generous mothers who wanted to share with us what they are currently using in their own home school.  Thank you so much for these Moms!

Galapagos Animals 3 Part Cards  by In Our Pond
France 3 Part Cards by Welcome to Mommyhood
Ocean Animals Clip Card by A Little Pinch of Perfect
Planets Learning Pack by 3 Dinosaurs

Now it’s time for this week’s link party! This is a BRAND new link up for all blog posts that include learn and play activities and hands-on education for kids. We are excited to read your blog posts and to see what you have to share! Please link up below and grab our button to display on your blog.

If you are a blogger, share your family friendly posts here. We are looking for things which include:

Montessori Education

Homeschool

Sensory Play

Tot and Preschool Trays

Fine and Gross Motor Activities

Kids in the Kitchen

Healthy Recipes for Kids

Arts and Crafts

Natural Living

Free Educational Printables

Family-Oriented Activities

Healthy Living 

Your post will be featured on each of our blogs where we will pick our favourite posts every other week. That means there is more of a chance that you will be featured!

Everyone, please meet our link party hosts:

Christian Montessori Blog ~ Please visit our CMN FB group ~ Pinterest

Vanessa from Mama’s Happy Hive~FB~Pinterest~Instagram~Twitter

Jennifer from Study at Home Mama~FB~Pinterest~Instagram~Twitter

Marie from Child Led Life~FB~Pinterest~Instagram~Twitter

Jae from Pinay Homeschooler~FB~Pinterest~Instagram~Twitter

Heather from Golden Reflections Blog~FB~Pinterest~Instagram~Twitter

Renae from Every Star is Different~FB~Pinterest

GUIDELINES FOR LINKING

Please link up 1-3 posts

Follow each of the hosts on social media

When you link up, please add our button and place it at the bottom of your shared posts or link back with text link.

By entering a link, you’re giving us permission to feature an image on our blogs. Proper credit & links will ALWAYS be given.

Please visit a couple of shared posts and leave a comment for them

Remember that you must link back in order to be featured

Grab This Button:

<div align="center"><a href="http://christianmontessorinetwork.com/category/learn-and-play" title="Christian Montessori Network"><img src="http://www.christianmontessorinetwork.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/learn-and-play-link-up-150-150.png" alt="Christian Montessori Network" style="border:none;" /></a></div>

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An InLinkz Link-up

Complete Guide to Insect Study for Grade-Schoolers

We just concluded our study of insects and oh boy, both Mavi and Vito had a wonderful time learning all about these creatures!  We’re having zoology (animal study) for this month (12 Months of Montessori Series) and I’m going to give you a complete guide on how to study insects with your kids.

What is an insect?

Start your unit study by learning what is an insect. Put it simply, it is an animal that has 6 legs with segmented bodies. And yes please, spiders are definitely NOT insects.  Now for Mavi to have a wider understanding of this subject, I've set up a sorting activity of the 4 major groups of the Arthropods.  Since we've done this last year, Mavi has a prior knowledge of the difference between insects and spiders.  He got confused with the crab though, if its either arachnids or crustaceans LOL.  Initially he placed it in the Arachnids   These animal figures were from Safari Toob Insects and Insect Lore.

The Life Cycle of an Insect

Now after learning about the animals that belong to the insect family,  we looked into the life cycles of an insect.  Here we talked about the insects that undergo “complete metamorphosis” and those with “incomplete metamorphosis”.  Note complete metamorphosis means, it has the stages of: egg-larva-pupa-adult. 

Materials here are Insect Lore Life Cycle of Butterfly and Ladybug

Parts of an Insect 

We also learned about the different parts of an insect. I have a separate post on this one and you read it here or click the image below.

Insect Habitats and Bug Hunting

I created guides on hunting insects in different habitats.  We have insects found in woodlands (in the forest), those found in rivers and lakes, the ones found everywhere and in the meadows/fields.  We used these guides as we go “bug hunting”.

We were able to catch a few insects like ladybird (escaped from our net after a few hours), this unidentified insect in the outdoor stairs and ants.

Vito was fascinated with ants! He also had a separate insect study for toddlers. 

Vito’s Insect Study

Previous Post on Insects

• The World of Arthropods Part One
• The world of Arthropods Part Two
• FREE Arthropods Chart
• Insect Activities for Preschooler
• Life Cycle of a Butterfly for Preschoolers
• Grasshoppers
• Parts of a Ladybird
• Life Cycle of a Ladybug

Thank you so much for taking time to read this post. I hope that I was able to give you enough ideas so you can also jumpstart your own insect study with your kids.

If you need some learning materials about insects you can also buy the following from my printable shop:
The Arthropods Learning Pack
The Insect
The Ant
The Grasshopper
The Dragonfly

This post is part of the 12 Months of Montessori Learning which is hosted by Natural Beach Living and The Natural Homeschool.

Natural Beach Living ~ The Natural Homeschool ~ Living Montessori Now ~ Planting Peas

The Kavanaugh Report ~ Mama’s Happy Hive ~ Study at Home Mama ~ Child Led Life

Every Star Is Different ~ Grace and Green Pastures ~ The Pinay Homeschooler