Animals in Winter

The big idea for the first three weeks of January is Animals in Winter. The first week is an introduction, and the second and third weeks focus on foxes, wolves, and coyotes. We will have a resource box for the first animals in winter week, but the box doesn't focus on that. The reason I checked it out is because it's full of stuffed animals and puppets that are useful for doing activities. The coyotes, foxes, and wolves weeks has a different box that is focused on those animals. I haven't seen the box, but they say it contains hides, skulls, pictures, books, and videos . . . along the lines of what you have come to expect from the kits.

Just a little background on the animals in winter topic, to make it easier to plan. A lot of people think of penguins and polar bears, but actually, those animals live in areas where it's mostly winter all of the time. However, the animals more local to us have to change their behaviors with the seasons in order to survive, so it is interesting to study those behaviors and compare them with what humans do. There are three basic ways animals survive winter (with many variations on each). They migrate, adapt, or hibernate (although you could argue that hibernation is an adaptation, it's different enough that I like to mention it separately). There are all kinds of fun activities you could do to act out each of these things. Let me know if you want to brainstorm together!