Mail from...Alaska

I LOVE when I have an idea for an okay lesson that Beck gets carried away with and pretty soon we've come up with something pretty cool!  That's what's happening right now-I had animal flash cards to divide into groups by number of legs or stripes/no stripes.  He, of course, took it a step farther and is now busily drawing an 11x14 "habitat" where all those animals can live.  He's amazing!

That's exactly what happened a few weeks ago when we pulled out our Alaska postcard!  (Oddly enough, the topic was animal related that day, too).  The postcard itself had no extra information written on it, but did have a cute cartoon of Alaska's baby animals.  I tested myself a minute, trying to remember the Alaska state bird and then was transported back to my time living there.  It really is a place where everything you hear about or see on tv is 100% real.

Alaska State Bird: Ptarmigan

We decided to use google images to find pictures of baby animals that live in Alaska.  We came up with photos for wolves, caribous, marmots, puffins, beluga whales, lynx, grizzly bears, salmon, mountain goats, and polar bears.

For an activity I found a simple tutorial to make a pop-up greeting card on Enchanted Learning.  I was excited to finally figure out how to do something as easy as that.  Beck's mind was running way ahead of mine and before I knew it we'd printed out all our baby animal images for him to put into his greeting card.

What was the last activity your children took eons farther than you had planned for?

Mail from...Texas

I spent many, many summers working in Alaskan hotels, and so have heard my fair share of proud Texans try to incorrectly assert that they live in the largest state in the nation.  And, while, I've driven through Texas several times and would agree that it is a massive amount of open space, my alliances have to stick with my northern roots on this one...nonetheless, Texas is a great state and I was very excited to introduce it this week in kindergarten.  

Since the Texas state bird is the mockingbird, and we already studied it during Arkansas/Apple Week, I decided instead to focus on the Texas state mammal (how many other states have a designated state mammal?).  If, like me, you've done any driving in the Lone Star state, you know it's not just a stereotype that the same animal could also be designated the official state roadkill.  And as roadkill goes, I'm going to declare that the armadillo is absolutely the most disgusting!

For the lesson, we looked at armadillo pictures and learned that armadillos like to burrow into the ground and use their noses to hunt for bugs.  We learned about the many different types of armadillos and then more specifically about the nine-banded armadillo which is the only armadillo native to the United States.

Texas State Mammal: Nine-Banded Armadillo

Beck's favorite was the Pink Fairy Armadillo which appears to be green and pink-two of his favorite colors. It also happens to be the smallest of the armadillos.

Unfortunately I had no time to get to the library this week, but I did find this online story about an armadillo named Arturo.  It wouldn't have been my first choice, but Beck liked it and it did teach how armadillos defend themselves in scary situations.

Clara and the Armadillo

My new favorite website is learn create love because it's full of printable cut-out templates and this is the one we used today...

Armadillo Printable from learn create love 

I really do love Texas.  I'm really glad I didn't go the cowboy route with this week's postcard.  I'm really glad Beck had so much fun learning about this odd little creature.  And I'm REALLY glad I'm not going to have to look at any more photos of this creepy little mammal for a very long time!

Have you been to Texas? 

 What is your favorite thing there?