Animal Adaptations

We have started a new unit in Moving Beyond the Page. We are now in Animal Adaptations. The kids are pretty fascinated by this and have enjoyed some of the things we have gotten to do. I utilized my iTouch for this unit and downloaded a couple of episodes of Extreme Animals (they air on Animal Planet). The kids enjoyed getting their individual turns with the ipod.
Joseph was quite impressed with the Water Bear. SO much so, that when instructed to create a character for a book that would represent himself as an animal, he chose the Water Bear.
Today, we looked at special adaptations needed for living in the desert and in the arctic. For the arctic, we did an experiment simulating "blubber".
First, the kids put the hands in a bowl of ice to see how long they could keep it there.
Libby is our cold loving girl and she lasted about 45 seconds.

Notice Caroline looking anxiously over Libby's shoulder. She was not thrilled with the idea of putting her hand in a bowl of ice. She touched the ice so she could see how cold it felt (yes, she is the one that was born in Vermont.)

Joseph was so fast that I couldn't get a picture (seriously, about 3 seconds).

Once we had our blubber mitten on though, it was MUCH easier.
Joseph made it all the way to 2 minutes


We made Libby stop after 5 minutes


Here is Caroline watching the stopwatch for Libby...


Caroline is still not thrilled with the ice thing, but she did say it was much better with blubber.


The blubber, for inquiring minds, is crisco sandwiched between two ziploc bags. I taped the edges together to make a mitten that the could put their hand into.

Oh, and yes, they were doing the experiment in character today. We had Underdog, Princess and Little Red Riding Hood.