Eric Carle

1. Eric Carle Literature Focus Unit Edu 315 Julie Mees

2. Literature Selection • Does A Kangaroo Have a Mother, Too? • Papa, Pleas get the moon for me • The Secret Birthday Message • The Mixed-Up Chameleon • Mister Seahorse • The Very Hungry Caterpillar • From Head to Toe

3. Theme Study • Students will take part in learning about the writings of the author Eric Carle. They will learn about the animals and rhythm of his books. This unit will integrate reading and writing with social studies, science, mathematics, art, music, and physical education. • Students will develop the understanding of the habitats of different animals and their life cycles, the stages of the moon, rhyme and rhythm

4. Language Arts: Reading Activities • Students will read many different books written by Eric Carle. Students will read within groups, look through books individually, read aloud, and guided reading. • Students will share their scrapbooks to the class • Students will find additional information about the moon, kangaroos, fish, and chameleons. (See technology) • Teacher will read a loud the books listed in literature selection with the children having reading time in groups and individually to go back through the books.

5. Language Arts: Writing Activities • Students will create a scrapbook with cut out pictures, drawings, and personal ideas of each book read in class. • Students will also create a page of questions they may have about any animals we have read about. • After reading “Papa, please get the moon for me.” students will join in groups and create ideas why the moon is sometimes a quarter or a half or a full moon. They will write in groups their ideas. • Students will create a formula poem about the moon with the formula being “If I….”

6. Language Arts: Speaking Activities • Students will work be doing group projects by reading through the books together after the teacher has read them aloud. • Students will be discussing ideas of the moon with each other. • Students will be working together making it through a maze by following directions based on the book “The Secret Birthday Message.” • Students will be reading aloud and sharing their scrap books about their personal ideas of the books that were read aloud to the class. • Students will be creating fish creatures out of socks and coloring them. They will be working in groups and sharing their ideas while they create their fish creatures from the book “Mister Seahorse.” • Students will have a Grand Conversation with each of the books read.

7. Language Arts: Listening Activities • Students will listen as the teacher reads the books aloud. • Students will listen in their groups as they go back through the books during the Grand conversations. • Students will listen as each student presents their scrapbooks and poems to the classmates. • Students will listen to each others ideas while discussing the books and sharing additional information about animals presented in the classroom. • Students will listen as they share their ideas on why the moon is sometimes a quarter or a half or a full moon.

8. Language Arts: Viewing Activities • Students will take a field trip to a pet store to see various fish • Students will view videos of kangaroos and penguins. • Student’s will view the other classmates pictures in their scrapbooks. • Students will create a map on a bulletin board of the maze in “A Birthday Message.” • Students will add words to the word wall from the vocabulary words each book.

9. Language Arts: Visually Representing Activities • Students will create a picture of the formula poem to display their poetry in the classroom. • Students will create a maze. • Students will be adding words to the Word Wall of the different subjects and animals in each book. • Students will be creating scrap books to share with the classroom. • Students will create fish out of socks which will be displayed. • Students will watch the movie “The Very Hungry Catipillar.”

10. Science Activities • Students will learn information about the stages of the moon. (Look at technology) They will add entries into their science notebook about new information they found. • Students will look on maps to see where numerous animals live. • Students will research more about kangaroos and their habitats (Look at technology) They will add this information the their science notebooks and share information in small groups what they have learned. • Students will create a caterpillar cage to watch the cycle of a caterpillar turning into a butterfly and they will document their findings each day of the changes. • Students will research what a chameleon needs to survive and what type of habitat they live in.

11. Mathematics Activities • Students will create a maze of their own using measurements, shapes, and colors • Students will play the game Memory, matching numbers of animals. • Students will estimate different paper caterpillars sizes by inches and centimeters and measure to check how accurate their estimation was • Students will graph and list all the different types of animals and how many they saw on their nature walk • Students will have different activity centers which they will rotate playing math games; The Very Hungry Catapillar, Go Fish (counting and matching patterns), and Counting Kangroo’s

12. Social Studies Activities • Looking at maps of where penguins, giraffes, buffaloes, monkeys, seals, gorillas, crocodile, camels, elephants, and salt water fish live. • Students will create pictures and place them on a map in the area the animals are from. • Students will create a picture scrapbook of their favorite animal and share information they find on this animal.

13. Music and Art activities • Students will be drawing pictures for their scrapbooks from the things they read about in their books; ex a man climbing to the moon or a giraffe. • Students will create a background for their formula poems that they will be writing about. • Teacher will have nature music playing in the background with sounds of animals and fish as the children do their work. • Teacher will bring in guitar and sing made up songs by the children. (Songs will not be planned but will have to deal with any of the themes of their books.) • Students will sing and act out Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes

14. Physical Education Activities • Students will act out the book “From Head to Toe.” • Students will participate in a obstacle course pretending to be an animal from one of the animals we have read about in the books. • Students will play Shark and Fish tag. • Students will take a nature walk observing the different types of bugs and animals that live around them

15. Technology • http://animals.nationalgeographic.com/animals/mammals/red-kangaroo.html • http://exoticpets.about.com/cs/chameleons/a/chameleonbasics_2.htm • http://exoticpets.about.com/gi/o.htm?zi=1/XJ&zTi=1&sdn=exoticpets&cdn=homegarden&tm=429&gps=92_284_851_417&f=00&tt=2&bt=1&bts=1&zu=http%3A//www.chameleonsonline.com • The movie “The Very Hungry Catipallar” • http://sunshine.chpc.utah.edu/labs/moon/lunar_phases_main.html

16. Language Arts Strategies • Activating background knowledge- Students will think about what they already know about the animalsand the moon • Brainstorming- students will think of ideas while creating their scrapbooks • Connecting- Students will relate topics to the world around them. They will be mapping and learning about different habits around the world • Predicting- students will be predicting the measurements of caterpillars. They will also be predicting while playing the Memory Game and Go Fish. Students will also be predicting where animals live. • Playing with Language- Students will be creating poetry, a story, and scrapbooking • Revising- Students will make changes to their written activities • Visualizing- Students will be drawing and creating visual images. Student will also see a caterpillar turn into a butterfly and make home for a chameleon.

17. Language Arts Skills • Print: Students will recognize new words on the word wall • Comprehension: Students will learn formula poetry. Students will learn new things about different animals and what types of habitats they live in and be able to place them on a map. • Language: Students will be working together to make different games, working together to get through the maze and sharing their poetry and scrapbooks with the class • Reference: Students will make graphs and read articles with other students, older peers, or the teacher.

18. Grouping Patterns • Large groups: grand conversations, swimming and zoo field trips, reading as a class, finding new information about any questions the students have about the moon or different animals. • Small groups: reading through the books again and looking at pictures closer, helping each other with sight words they have already learned, adding new words to the word wall that they have learned from Eric Carle’s books, working on making fish out of socks or any other animal they may decide to create out of a sock. • Individual: writing poetry, scrapbooking, individual reading of the books.

19. Assessments • Participation in the grand conversations and group projects • Informal observations of authors chair and art projects • Portfolio of scrapbooks, poetry, animal collages and mazes • Checklist on graphs, maze measurements, measurement of caterpillars • Active participation in P.E. and music and art