- Objectives
- To introduce children to mammals.
- To have each child able to define mammals by two or more characteristics.
- To expose children to various mammal footprints.
- To have each child able to identify at least two common, non-domestic mammals.
- To introduce children to the names of animal offspring.
- Introduction
- What are mammals? (Warm-blooded, feed the young on mother’s milk, have backbones, have hair)
- Are there any mammals in the room? (Yes, humans are mammals.)
- What are some ways we can identify different mammals? (Color of hair/fur, size, habitat, footprints, etc.)
- Program
- Read: A Mammal is an Animal by Lizzy Rockwell. Discuss the ways we classify mammals, what animals we know about or own (or ourselves).
- Read: Actual Size by Steve Jenkins. You can decide if you only want to read about the mammals or if you want to include the insects, reptiles, etc. Take out the tape measure to show the ACTUAL SIZE of the animals. The bear can be measured against a wall or on the floor! It is pretty cool to compare the sizes of the full animals. You can use tape on the floor to get the full comparisons, or a chart with squares for the children to fill in. (It can be one that everyone sees, or the chart that they take home. One Square = One Foot.)
- Hand out the mammal rubber finger puppets. There are two of every animal (46 heads), so you should be able to handle any size crowd for this exercise. NOTE: The gorilla, orangutan, chimpanzee, and bonobo are hard to distinguish unless you look at a picture. Look at a picture. One of each pair, except gorilla, are labeled inside.
- Ask the children what they know about their animals, if anything. Read some of the facts from The Clue is in the Poop by Andy Seed. (Poop Pages 6-9; Footprint pages 20, 24-27) NOTE: Pick out your clues ahead of time!!! This is an opportunity to name the young (baby) mammals as you go over some of the facts about mammals.
- Names of young (baby) mammals
- Calf – cattle, elephant, antelope, rhino, hippo, whale
- Cub – lion, bear, shark
- Fawn – deer
- Foal – horse, zebra
- Heifer – cow
- Joey – kangaroo
- Kid – goat
- Kit – fox, beaver, rabbit
- Kitten – cat
- Lamb – sheep
- Piglet – pig
- Pup – dog, seal, fox
- Read: The Little Hedgehog by Rosalee Wren. Take out the Hedgehog Puppet and show the children the puppet as you read the book.
- Read: Whose Feet? OR Whose Nose? OR Whose Ears? as a silly and noisy activity. (Let them guess their answers out loud!)
- Activities
- OPTIONAL: Play the “Animal Smell Game” with the children. Pass around the containers with the substances in them, and see if they can figure out what each is. OR Have the containers on a table, with the cards of different animals (depending on the ages of the participants) for them to simply think about and guess as an activity while waiting to stamp out the footprints.
- Art Activity: Have the children use the stamp pads with the footprint stamps.
- Handouts: Hand each child a Mammal Word Search paper, a mammal fact page and the two Ranger Rick pages. (All are optional – your choice.)
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