A LITTLE FOOTWORK--JUST FOR FUN!

I want to kick off my newest WHAT IF YOU HAD!? book WHAT IF YOU HAD ANIMAL FEET!?. So here are some fun activities to start things hopping.

( Below each activity, the Common Core State Standards being developed for grade 2 and 3 are identified)

LET’S STOMP

Have each child choose his or her favorite animal feet. 

Choose some foot stomping music and have the children spread out at least an arm’s length apart. Then turn on the music and have kids dance where they’re standing. 

Remind them to dance as if they had their favorite animal feet.

Afterwards, ask the children to tell how it was different to dance with that animal’s feet. Next, have them tell how they think it would be different to do each of these things if they had that animal’s feet.

• Take a bath
• Pick up their room
• Make their bed

Now, let them pick another animal’s feet, start the music, and dance some more!

•   CCSS.ELA-Literacy.W.2.3 Write narratives in which they recount a well-elaborated event or short sequence of events, include details to describe actions, thoughts, and feelings, use temporal words to signal event order, and provide a sense of closure.

BEASTIE SHOE SHOP

Start by having children list all the kinds of shoes they can think of. That list will include: boots, sneakers, loafers, high heels, waders, sandals, high tops—and more.

This animal's shoes will need to be big and tough!

As a class, vote on one animal from WHAT IF YOU HAD ANIMAL FEET!? to treat to their very first pair of shoes. 

Share building a list of ideas to answer these questions:

• What should those shoes do for the animal’s feet?
• What material will the shoes need to be made out of to fit the animal’s habitat and behavior?
• What special features could be added to the animal’s shoes to make them extra special?  

Have the children work alone or in small groups to draw and color pictures or make models of their special animal’s new shoes.

•   CCSS.ELA-Literacy.W.2.7 Participate in shared research and writing projects (e.g., read a number of books on a single topic to produce a report; record science observations).

MY NEAT FEET

The Rest of the Story

Have children look through WHAT IF YOU HAD ANIMAL FEET!? and pick their favorite picture of a boy or girl with animal feet. Now have them tell the rest of the story.

Each of those pictures shows only one moment in a story. Challenge children to imagine--and tell--the rest.

• What led up to the moment shown in the picture?
• What is really happening in the picture?
• How is this story likely to end?

For example, look on page 19 at the boy digging for treasure with aardvark feet. How did he get the treasure map and find the right spot to dig?

How does he feel about finding the treasure? And what kind of treasure did he find?

What will he do now that he’s found the treasure? How will it change his life?

•   CCSS.ELA-Literacy.W.3.3 Write narratives to develop real or imagined experiences or events using effective technique, descriptive details, and clear event sequences.

NEW FEET

I'm sure everyone will agree that the animals in the book  have totally cool feet. For this activity ask children to pick an animal that isn’t in the book. 

Have them dig into books and work with older students or adults to search on-line and find out about that animal. 

Most important, encourage them to find the answers to these two questions:

1. What are that animal's feet like?

2. How does the animal use its feet to move and stay alive?

Next, like WHAT IF YOU HAD ANIMAL FEET!? have children make two-pages (a left hand/right hand spread) for their animal. On one page, they should answer the two questions. On the second page, they should share at least one super fun way it would be cool to have that animal’s feet for a day.

•       CCSS.ELA-Literacy.W.2.5 With guidance and support from adults and peers, focus on a topic and strengthen writing as needed by revising and editing.

•       CCSS.ELA-Literacy.W.3.4 With guidance and support from adults, produce writing in which the development and organization are appropriate to task and purpose. (Grade-specific expectations for writing types are defined in standards 1–3 above.)

FOOT SWAP

What if one of the animals in WHAT IF YOU HAD ANIMAL FEET!? woke up one day with another kind of animal’s feet!?

Ask children to imagine what it would be like if—

A Mountain Goat had White Rhinoceros feet?

A Cheetah had Eastern Gray Kangaroo feet?

A Barn Owl had Cheetah feet?

A Giant African Millipede had Green Basilisk feet?

A Wolf had Duck-Billed Platypus feet?

Or make up another foot swap.  

Challenge children to think of something totally cool that animal could do with its new feet. Be sure they also consider how that swap might cause serious problems.

•   CCSS.ELA-Literacy.W.3.1 Write opinion pieces on topics or texts, supporting a point of view with reasons.

Did you and your students enjoy leaping into these activities? Then run with these ideas and come up with even more. 

Fun With TOAD WEATHER

TOAD WEATHER is one of those books you can have fun reading more than one time.  So after you read it the first time, read it again and again as you have fun with these activities.

Compare and Contrast

Can you find ways things change for Ally during her rainy day adventure in TOAD WEATHER?

1.  How does Ally feel about a rainy day at the beginning of the story?
     And when she's walking home with Mama and Grandma at the end of the story?

2.  When she first gets outside, Ally starts to hurry.  How is this different from the way Ally walks through the puddles?

How does Ally walk while carrying toads across the street.

How does Ally walk when she's on her way home?

3.  Looking out the window at the beginning of the story, Ally thinks the rainy day is just gloomy gray. But outside, she thinks it's like being inside something colorful.

What is that something? 

Why does she think that?

What Happened When?

Ally discovered a lot of things during her TOAD WEATHER adventure. 

She counts five of them as surprises. 

List those surprises in the order they happened. 

Which one did Grandma think wasn't a nice surprise.

Its On The News

Pretend you are a television news reporter. Based on what happens in the story, write a TOAD WEATHER news report about this event.

Include a quote from Ally about what it was like to help the toads.

Include a quote from Grandma too.

Another Story

Ally isn't the only child who discovered the migrating toads. Look at the little boy and his mother on pages 18 and 19.  Now, write a short story about his adventure. Be sure to tell why you think this boy and his mother are outside on a rainy night. Did they come especially to help or just happen onto the scene?

From the picture, how do you think the boy feels about the toads?

Tell why you believe he did or didn't help the toads.

Toads Eye View

Now tell about this TOAD WEATHER night from one toad's point of view.














Make this a story about an American toad. That's the kind of toad featured in TOAD WEATHER.


Tell how the toad goes from its home in a nearby park to a reservoir on the other side of a busy street. Be sure to include real facts about these toads.  Find out more about American toads online at these websites.
BioKids: Critter Page about American Toads
Fairfax County Schools American Toad Page

Make your story an adventure by giving the toad a couple of close calls. A bird or a dog might almost catch it. It might almost get hit by a car before someone carries it across the road.

Extra Fun

And don't miss this website--Doug Wechsler Author and Photographer--American Toad. You'll see photos and learn about the stages an American toad goes through during its life.

It's a special site to visit after reading TOAD WEATHER because Dr. Doug Wechsler was one of the expert's who shared information and checked the facts included in this story.

Now, just for fun, draw lines on a white paper plate, dividing it into four parts. Then draw and color a picture of one stage of the American toad's life cycle on each part of the plate.

Egg

Tadpole

Toadlet

Adult

Then poke a pin through the center of the plate into a sturdy plastic straw. Spin the plate to see the toad's life cycle repeat over and over again--just as it does in real life.

Teachers Share Using WHAT IF YOU HAD ANIMAL HAIR!? PLUS MORE

I love when teachers post activities or share other ways they're making the most of my books in their classrooms. So I'm delighted to share teacher-developed activities built around one of my newest books, WHAT IF YOU HAD ANIMAL HAIR!?  Plus I'll add my ways to build on these.

Learning to the Core shares a free download where kids are challenged to first choose one of the animals from the book. Next, children are asked to draw a picture of themselves with that animal's hair. Then students research to find out and share more facts about the animal they picked.

FROM ME: I loved when children made masks for WHAT IF YOU HAD ANIMAL TEETH!? to share themselves with their favorite animal's teeth. How about having kids make masks or even costumes to imagine having their favorite animal's hair. It could even be fun to have a party kids attend as their hairy animals. Encourage each to tell one way their hair helps them survive--even thrive--as that animal.



Nancy Vandenberge's First Grade Windows On Wonder shares encouraging students to imagine how having hair like one of the animals in WHAT IF YOU HAD ANIMAL HAIR!? would help them.

FROM ME: I'd love children to imagine their entire family having hair like their favorite animal from WHAT IF YOU HAD ANIMAL HAIR!?

• How would family grooming change?
• How might this effect how the family is viewed by the neighbors?
• How might having this hair even change what activities the family does together?

Practickle.com offers an idea for WHAT IF YOU HAD ANIMAL TEETH!? for third-graders that will work just as well for WHAT IF YOU HAD ANIMAL HAIR!? It's which animal's hair would you least like to have? And why?  

First Grade Fairytales points out--It's a great way to get kids writing their opinions. Just push them to give more than one reason to really get them thinking. 

FROM ME: Third-graders could imagine giving the animal whose hair they'd least like to have a makeover. What would they do to improve that animal's hair color? Length? Special features?

How could a makeover change a three-toed sloth?

Then challenge kids to imagine how such a makeover is likely to change how that animal lives, including how it stays safe, what it eats, and how it hangs out with others of its own kind.

And EVEN MORE!

Could a tiger do as well with any other color or kind of hair?

Have your class decide to add on to WHAT IF YOU HAD ANIMAL HAIR!? Then work as a class or in small groups to choose at least three more animals to include in the book. Use the book's format to first tell something key about that animal's hair and how it helps the animal. Next, have each child brainstorm how having that kind of animal hair might be helpful. Or just plain fun!






Imagine animals in the book being able to trade hair with another animal. Then think about how that would change that animal. And how it would change how they live.  For example, what if a star-nosed mole had porcupine hair?  Or a polar bear had zebra hair?

Or what if a polar bear had reindeer hair?

Now, start brainstorming activities for what's coming soon--

WHAT IF YOU HAD ANIMAL FEET!?

DEAR READER

I love receiving letters from young readers. Yesterday, I received a wonderful letter from a third grader in Mrs. Akason's class in Brookview Elementary School in West Des Moines, Iowa.  I was so impressed with her thoughtful questions I'd like to share her letter with you. And my answers.

NOTE: Child's name purposefully deleted

Hello!

I liked receiving your letter and finding out that you too like exploring outdoors. In fact, I was impressed with how well you write for being 8 years old. SMILE!

And you’ve also asked me some of the most interesting questions I’ve ever been asked: Why did I want to be an author? How did I find all that out about animals? What did I do when I was little? These are such interesting questions because all of the answers go together.

I was an only child so I didn’t have any brothers and sisters. Plus there were few children to play with in my neighborhood. So I read lots of books and spent a lot of time at my grandparent’s house. That I loved because it was just outside the little town I grew up in, Fostoria, Ohio, in the middle of a farming area. There were fields and forests and streams around. Best of all, my grandfather loved the outdoors and was happy to share all the “treasures” I found on my journeys into this just wild enough world. One summer, I rescued a young fox squirrel with fur as red as my hair that liked to ride on my shoulder until it was ready to go off on its own. So was born my fascination with animals and my desire to really understand them and how they live in their world.

I wandered.

I wondered.

I watched and loved what I saw.

No surprise that when I went to college I majored in biology, which is the study of animal life. Summers, during college, I worked at a girl’s camp in Vermont, taking groups on trips to hike, canoe, and explore the forests, lakes, and rivers in that area. When I started teaching school fulltime, I mainly taught science from fifth through eighth grades and always did a lot of outdoor investigating. My classes made rock collections, leaf collections, insect collections, and bird feeders to draw the local birds close enough to study. We also set up nature trails and planted vegetable gardens on the school grounds.

In those years, it seemed to me there were never enough really interesting—fun—books for children about animals and nature. That’s why I began writing my own. These were first for my students and my own son and daughter. Then, once I was published, for lots of young readers, like you. SMILE. And one of the biggest things I worked to change was to have my nonfiction books be in full color. It may be hard to believe now but when I first starting publishing all of the photos and even the art in nonfiction books were always black and white. I was thrilled when my publishers finally agreed to have my books be in full color. Now, they always are.

I’ve now published well over 200 different books but I’m not done. There are so many interesting animals and parts of the world to investigate and share. I love finding out about all the animals. Sometimes, like my three trips to Antarctica to live with 60,000 Adelie penguins while they raised their chicks, I learn for myself. Just as exciting is that I’m able to connect with experts around the world who have spent their lives studying animals. And they kindly share their research adventures with me.

So I hope this answers your questions.  You make me wonder some of my own, like what do you like about the outdoors? What are your favorite animals to read about? And do you sometimes write stories of your own about animals? Writing books about animals for children is a wonderful career. I know I love it! As well as you write already, this could be something to think about for your future.

With Very Best Wishes!

Sandra Markle