Penguin Activities in Kindergarten

 

We kicked off our penguin unit with a fun poem all about penguins!  This little ditty is to the tune “Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star.”

Of course, we had to practice waddling like a daddy penguin!  We were so careful not to drop our egg on the floor.  We even timed how long it took us to waddle back to our seats.  Boy, waddling sure is hard work!

Speaking of carrying an egg on top of your feet, we also learned all about the life cycle of a penguin…including a few important vocabulary words such as incubate, brood pouch, regurgitate (which we thought was disgusting!) and fledgling.

This life cycle anchor chart really helped us create a visual representation of the penguin life cycle.

One of my favorite books to use during our penguin unit is The Emperor’s Egg by Martin Jenkins.  It tells all about the life cycle of a penguin.  We actually created the above anchor chart as we read the book.  Plus, the illustrations are gorgeous, and it fit in perfectly with our Penguin Life Cycle craftivity!

We also enjoyed reading these nonfiction penguin readers from Crayons and Cuties in Kindergarten!  My kiddos begged to read a new one each day!  They just couldn’t get enough!

I especially loved that they were written with kid friendly words that helped reinforce many of the sight words we were learning.

The kiddos even wanted to read them during our Daily 5 routine!  One student would read a page, while the other student would check for understanding.  We simply asked “who is this page about” and “what is this page about.”

Now, no penguin unit would be complete without some penguin crafts!  We used these Penguin Flap Books as a culminating activity to help solidify our learning.  First, we made the penguin craft.

Then, we used the penguin tree map to review all we had learned.

Each kiddo used their completed tree map to help them finish the inside of our Penguin Flap Books.  These were a huge hit with not only the students, but also other teachers, school visitors and parents!  Gah!  Their illustrations are just the cutest!

 

 

We chose to use the can, are, have templates, but this set also includes templates for penguin facts, penguin diagram, penguins vs. birds, penguin life cycle, penguin predators, penguin diet and penguin habitat.

And how about this cute penguin craft our art teacher completed with the kids?!  They looked adorable hanging in the hallway!

We even integrated our penguin learning into our math instruction.  Did you all know that an Emperor Penguin can grow to four feet tall?!  Of course, we had to measure ourselves by laying next to our four foot Emperor!  Then, we used some penguin cards to measure the height of the Emperor in nonstandard units.

Once we figured out his height, we worked with a partner to measure our nonstandard height.  Some of us were shorter than an Emperor, some taller, and a few of us were the exact same size!

Our most favorite penguin activity was the blubber experiment!  Simply place two large Ziploc bags inside each other.  Fill the inside between the two bags with Crisco, roll the top down and secure with Duct Tape.  My kiddos happily called this the “blubber bag.”

We followed the scientific method while conducting our little experiment.  Therefore, we made a hypothesis and tested the ice water without the “blubber bag.”  We described the water.  It was freezing!

Then, we placed the “blubber bag” inside the water and inserted our hand into the “blubber bag.”

We learned that the blubber helped insulate our hand and keep it warm, much like the blubber helps keep a penguin’s body warm!  Grab the FREE recording sheet below!

At the listening station, we listened to If You Were a Penguin by Wendell and Florence Minor.  It tells all about the things penguins can do, such as “fly underwater,” “sing a duet,” “live on land but get really wet,” “wear a tuxedo,” “live underground or on top of the ice,” and our most favorite, “toboggan.”  After listening to the story, we completed a simple response sheet to check for understanding.

Some of us made text-to-self connections!

Grab the response sheet below!

I hope you were able to find some fun penguin ideas to use in your classroom!

If you’re looking for more penguin fun, head on over to my “Penguins” board on Pinterest!

Don’t forget to waddle on over to these other blogs for more penguin activities and freebies!