The Great Penguin Flop

This past week we studied penguins...or at least we were supposed to study penguins.  I meticulously cut out tens frames for our goldfish, matching cards, and researched with the boys where the various penguins we had in our pack came from.  I had this beautiful week of lesson plans sitting in the school area, and about 95% of it was a flop.

Monday, the boys were beyond over tired.  They were happy to start penguins, but with it being a snow day for the other kiddos around here, their attention span lasted all of 5 minutes.  And honestly, I cannot blame them.  Why would you not want to play in the snow?  The only thing they were truly interested in was a youtube video about emperor penguins.  I wish I had saved it, it really was awesome.

Tuesday was not a planned school day.  That is our day we usually attend the local playgroup and play with our friends and teachers.  However, Carter's stomach had other plans for us, and we were forced to stay home.  :(   I had to pull "school" time out of my hat really quick, since Pierce made it quite clear that he could not do his day without school.  So, we built our Melissa and Doug world map puzzle, and physically put our penguins on the continents they belonged on.  Just for comparison, we also put our arctic animals in the arctic circle.  That was actually a much better visual than I had anticipated, and the boys really got into looking all around the world.  They were also introduced to the concept of hemispheres.

 

Later that day we put sand on the light table, and they had a blast writing and filling their 3-D shapes.  Pierce actually pointed out to me which shape was the hemisphere and which was the sphere.  They were also having fun figuring out which was a cube, cylinder, and pyramid.  Over all, it was the best day we had all week.

Wednesday was yet another snow day.  That means everyone is home, and well, school does not happen when everyone is home.  I had learned that 2 days prior.  It did mean that we went outside and built a snow fort and played with penguins in the snow.  We had them belly sliding, and we even had humans attempting to belly slide.  That was hilarious.

Thursday we did water resist art.  I had the boys color on paper with crayons, and then try to water color over the crayon.  It does not work, since the wax from the crayons makes the paper resistant to the water.  That is the same concept of the oil the penguins have and spread all over their body; it makes their feathers resistant to the water.  They thought that was one of the coolest things ever, and made several pictures that way.

Then Friday was yet another wash out.  I was so incredibly sick this time, and there was no way I could do school.  I tried; I honestly did.  I wrote the poem on the board and everything.  But instead, we all loaded up into the car so I could get some Pepto before I had to drive to NY later that evening by myself.

Normally I would attempt to redo the lesson the next week, but the boys honestly were not too into the penguins.  Upon arriving home today, I packed up all the penguins, along with the penguin table, and brought out the materials for Valentine's day.  They are so excited to do Valentine's day activities!  And honestly, I am too.

I hope everyone else had a great week, and if I do not post before Friday, Happy Valentine's Day!