Daylight Starlight Wildlife, by Wendell Minor

This book explores animals that are diurnal/awake during the day and those that are nocturnal/awake at night. Mr. Minor has painted beautiful lifelike pictures to bring this story alive.

Materials

Star cutouts
Tissue paper in 1-inch squares
Animal cards to sort
1-2 small flashlights
1-4 small blankets or towels from dramatic center
Packet of star stickers

Vocabulary

Soars- flies high in the sky
Kits-baby rabbits are called kits
Forage-to look for food
Luminous-glowing or shimmering
Fearless- to be unafraid
Sprightly-active, always moving
Scope-checking out
Diurnal-awake during the day
Nocturnal-awake during the night

Before Reading the Story

Tell the children that you are going to read a book about nocturnal animals (animals who come out at night) and diurnal animals (animals who come out during the day). Have the children repeat the words. Ask them if they can think of an animal that might be nocturnal, remind them that nocturnal means to come out at night. Then ask them if they can think of an animal that is diurnal. Allow them a chance to brainstorm and write their responses on a piece of paper. Look at the cover; Ask the children if they can tell which side represents daylight and which represent the night or starlight? How can they tell? (It’s yellow like the sun, it’s got stars and the moon on it). Ask them if they can name the animal that is diurnal, nocturnal. Introduce the book.

Science/Scientific Knowledge; expands knowledge of and abilities to observe, describe, and discuss the natural world, living things, and natural processes.

Reading the Story

Stop on the first page and see how many of the animals the children can name. Stop on the page with the red fox and ask the children if they can see what he is pouncing on (a mouse, dinner). Take your time turning the pages, allowing the children the opportunity to share any experiences they might have about the animal/s on the page.

Science/Scientific Knowledge; expands knowledge of and abilities to observe, describe, and discuss the natural world, living things, and natural processes. AND Language Development/Speaking & Communicating; develops increasing abilities to understand and use language to communicate information, experiences, ideas, feelings, opinions, needs, questions; and for other varied purposes.

After Reading the Story

Post your list from before reading the story onto the wall and re-read it aloud to the children. Ask them if they can recall any other animals that might have been mentioned in the story. When they name an animal, ask if it should be written on the nocturnal side or the diurnal side?

Mathematics/Patterns & Measurement; shows growth in matching, sorting, putting in series, and regroup objects according to one or two attributes such as color, shape, or size.

Discovery

Cut around the many animal cards and put into a bowl. Put out one piece of dark paper with the word ‘nocturnal’ written across the top and one piece of light paper with the word ‘diurnal” written across the top. The children can take the animal cards and sort them onto the correct sheet of paper. Once they are finished, ask them if they can name the animals.

Mathematics/Patterns & Measurement; shows growth in matching, sorting, putting in series, and regroup objects according to one or two attributes such as color, shape, or size.

Music and Movement

Remind the children that nocturnal/night and diurnal/day are opposites. Sing Everything I Always Say to Pop Goes the Weasel verse. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FtfpkI-2CKg

Everything I always say, you always say the opposite.

When I say up, you say down.

Everything I always say, you always say the opposite.

When I say diurnal, you say nocturnal.

(As you sing and name the first half of the opposite, stop and see if the children can name the 2^nd half. Continue naming opposites until the children loose interest).

Do the following as a chant.

Left foot, right foot I am cool Tap left foot and right foot accordingly.

Left foot, right foot I learned at school.

Do left hand, right hand, left ear, eye, nostril, etc

Social & Emotional Development/Self-Concept; begins to develop and express awareness of self in terms of specific abilities, characteristics, and preferences.

Blocks

Encourage the children to use the blocks to make patterns. Show them how to stand a rectangle block, square block, rectangle block, square block, etc.

Mathematics/Patterns & Measurement;enhances abilities to recognize, duplicate, and extend simple patterns using a variety of materials.

Art

Make stained glass windows by laying a sheet of waxed paper on the table. Put out many 1-inch square of tissue paper and a cup/bowl of glue and a paintbrush for each child. Show them how to paint the glue onto the tissue paper and then lay a piece of tissue paper on top of the waxed paper. Continue painting on the glue and adding tissue paper. As the pieces of tissue paper overlap, new colors will appear. Encourage the children to paint the tissue paper on flat instead of balled. Allow it to dry flat. When it is dry, cut a star shape out of black construction paper. Staple the child’s tissue art behind the star cutout. These look lovely in a sunny window.

Creative Arts/Art; develops growing abilities to plan, work independently, and demonstrate care and persistence in a variety of art project.

Sand and Water

Add baby dolls, a washcloth and several dish towels for bathing the babies. While the children are bathing the babies, ask them if they take a bath or shower at home? Do they take it in the morning/day or at night?

Social & Emotional Development/Knowledge of Families & Communities; develops growing awareness of jobs and what is required to perform them.

Library and Writing

Put the book into the center and add a flashlight for fun reading.

Literacy/Book Knowledge & Appreciation; shows growing interest in reading related activities, such as asking to have a favorite book read; choosing to look at books; drawing pictures based on stories; asking to take a book home; going to the library; and engaging in pretend reading with other children.

Dramatic Play

Darken your dramatic corner as much as possible and tell the children that you have added some blankets to the center so they can pretend that it is nighttime. Ask them what else they might need and help them to supply what you can and to problem solve those items you cannot supply. (My group said they needed more books and toothbrushes. We got more books but problem-solved using their fingers as pretend toothbrushes). Encourage them to act out their nighttime rituals.

Social & Emotional Development/Knowledge of Families & Communities; progresses in understanding similarities and respecting differences among people such as genders, race, special needs, culture, language, and family structure.

Math and Manipulatives

Bring a dice and the star stickers to the table. Give each child a half a piece of dark construction paper. Let the children take turns rolling the dice and adding that many stars on to their paper. When children have had 4 turns, help them to count the number of stars on their paper. With a white pencil or crayon write their name and the number of stars they counted. (Kerry has 17 stars). If your children are wild dice rollers, bring a box top or a cubby to roll the dice into.

Mathematics/Numbers & Operations; develops increasing ability to count to 10 and beyond. AND Mathematics/Numbers & Operations; begins to use one-to-one correspondence in counting objects and matching groups of objects.

Outdoor Play

Take the book out onto the playground and re-read the story. Open the book and go through the pages having the children act out the different animal walks or flights.

Physical Health & Development/Gross Motor Skills; shows increasing levels of proficiency, control, and balance in walking, climbing, running, jumping, hopping, skipping, marching, and galloping.

Transitions

Play category with the children. Say the word nocturnal/during the night or diurnal/during the day and the child must name something they do during that period.

Approaches to learning/Reasoning & Problem-Solving; develops increasing ability to find more than one solution to a question, task, or problem. AND Language Development/Speaking & Communicating; uses an increasingly complex and varied spoken vocabulary.

Resources

Archibald’s Opposites, by Phil Vischer

This little story helps teach the concepts of opposites in a fun and silly way.

Materials

Opposite cards
Templates for basket, cucumber, and tomato
Roll of aluminum foil
Black and white paper

Vocabulary

Absurd (so crazy it doesn’t even make sense)
Opposites (two things that are totally different)

Before Reading the Story

Ask the children if they have ever heard the word opposites? Ask them to explain to you what it means. Give them the definition of opposites and ask if they can think of any. If they can not or they have finished doing so, introduce the book and say that this story will help us understand opposites better.

Language Development/Listening & Understanding; understands an increasingly complex and varied vocabulary.

Reading the Story

As you read, pause on each page to see if the children can name the opposite. After you have read the page say, “____ and ____ are opposites. Have the children repeat.

Approaches to Learning/Reasoning & Problem Solving; develops increasing abilities to classify, compare, and contrast objects, events, and experiences.

After Reading the Story

Make a set of the opposite cards. Give each child a card from half the set. Hold up a card from the second set and see if the children can figure out who has the opposite.

Approaches to Learning/Reasoning & Problem Solving; develops increasing abilities to classify, compare, and contrast objects, events, and experiences. AND Mathematics/Geometry & Spacial Sense; builds an increasing understanding of directionality, order, and positions of objects, and words such as up, down, over, under, top, bottom, inside, outside, in front, behind.

Discovery

Show the children pictures of two objects/items. Ask the children to help you make a list of how they are alike/how they are different. (try bringing in a picture of a dog and a horse, a chair and a crate, bird and an insect, a worm and a snake)

Approaches to Learning/Reasoning & Problem Solving; develops increasing abilities to classify, compare, and contrast objects, events, and experiences. AND Science/Scientific Skills & Methods; develops growing abilities to collect, describe, and record information through a variety of means, including discussion, drawings, maps, and charts.

Music and Movement

Teach the children Everything I Always Say, to chorus of Pop Goes the Weasel. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oWGp9rsKuEU

Everything I always say,

You always say the opposite.

When I say open,

You say (closed).

(Continue with opposites that you and the children have been working on.)

Language Development/Listening & Understanding; demonstrates increasing ability to attend to and understand conversations, stories, songs, and poems. AND Mathematics/Geometry & Spacial Sense; builds an increasing understanding of directionality, order, and positions of objects, and words such as up, down, over, under, top, bottom, inside, outside, in front, behind.

Sing the King of York and stand up and squat down as the song goes along. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TWWNFB8grkw

Language Development/Listening & Understanding; demonstrates increasing ability to attend to and understand conversations, stories, songs, and poems.

Blocks

Challenge the children to build a pattern with the blocks using large and small blocks.

Mathematics/Patterns & Measurement; enhances abilities to recognize, duplicate, and extend simple patterns using a variety of materials.

Art

Cut out a 12 inch sheet of aluminum foil. Put out a variety of shapes cut from only black and white paper. Encourage the children to collage onto the foil.

Creative Arts/Art; gains ability in using different art media and materials in a variety of ways for creative expression and representation.

Library and Writing

Make tracing templates out of a manila file folder for the basket, cucumber, and tomato. Have the children trace them and cut them out. Assemble the basket. Ask the children to glue one of the vegetables inside the basket and one outside the basket. Have them tell you which is in and which is out. Write it on the basket. (The tomato is in the basket, the cucumber is outside the basket).

Physical Health & development/Fine Motor Skills; develops growing strength, dexterity, and control needed to use tools such as scissors, paper punch, stapler, and hammer. AND Mathematics/Geometry & Spatial Sense; builds an increasing understanding of directionality, order, and positions of objects, and words such as up, down, over, under, top, bottom, inside, outside, in front, behind.

Sand and water

Put sand in the table today. Make 56 1 inch cards from a manila file. Write a set of capital alphabet letters and a set of lower case alphabet letters. Mix them up into the sand and see if the children can match the upper and lower case letters as they dig through the sand.

Literacy/Alphabet Knowledge; identifies at least 10 letters of the alphabet, especially those in their own name.

Dramatic Play

Encourage the children to act out or make opposites while playing in the center today. (I can sit and I can stand, I put all the food in the fridge, I took all the food out of the fridge).

Approaches to Learning/Reasoning & Problem Solving; develops increasing ability to find more than one solution to a question, task, or problem.

Math and Manipulatives

Use counters with the children. Put 3 bears on the table. Ask the child if he can show you more. Ask her if she can show you less. Take a handful and have the child take a handful, can the child tell you who has more and less? Sort the bears by color, does one color have more or less than the other?

Mathematics/Number & Operation; begins to use language to compare numbers of objects with terms such as more, less, greater than, fewer, equal to.

Outdoor Play

Draw several large shapes on the sidewalk. Give the children bean bags and call out a shape. The child sees if he can throw his bean bag to land inside the shape.

Physical Health & Development/Gross Motor Skills; demonstrates increasing abilities to coordinate movements in throwing, catching, kicking, bouncing balls, and using the slide and swing.

Transitions

The teacher says an opposite word and the child tries to name the correct response. In-Out, Under-Over, etc..

Language Development/Listening & Understanding; understands an increasingly complex and varied vocabulary.

Dear Parent- today we talked about opposites. This can be a confusing concept for young children but you can help by making a game out of it. Give your child a simple word/concept and ask them if they can think of the opposite. Some that we use in school are day-night, up-down, in front-behind, tall-short, young-old, near-far, and happy-sad.

Resources

The Berenstain Bears Inside, Outside, Upside Down by Stan & Jan Berenstain

This silly book has few words but wonderful descriptions of inside and outside, as well as upside down.

Materials

Boxes big enough for the children to climb inside of. (Ask your cook to save boxes that the schools food is delivered in).
A tumble mat or large pillow
Roll of masking tape
Hoola Hoop
3-5 bean bags
One smaller box with a school object inside
A tray of ice cubes and a glass

Vocabulary

Before Reading the Story

Before the children arrive, put one favorite school toy in a box and seal it shut. Bring it to the group area and tell the children that you have put something inside the box. Let the children take turns asking a question and then guessing what it might be. If your children are unable to ask questions, give them clues. Pass the box around and let the children shake it. Tell them that it might be something that they would see in a particular center. Tell them what color it is or what material it is made out of. The idea is for the children to be able to guess from clues that you have given or questions that they have asked.

Approaches to Learning/Reasoning & Problem Solving; develops increasing abilities to classify, compare, and contrast objects, events, and experiences. AND Language Development/Speaking & Communicating; develops increasing abilities to understand and use language to communicate information, experiences, ideas, feelings, opinions, needs, questions, and for other varied purposes.

Reading the Story

This is a super short story. Read it to the children and then go back and help the children read it to you.

Literacy/Book Knowledge & Appreciation; demonstrates progress in abilities to retell and dictate stories from books and experiences: to act out stories in dramatic play; and to predict what will happen next in a story.

After Reading the Story

Bring a doll or stuffed animal to the group area. Using the box from Before Reading the Story, have the first child put the doll inside the box. Have the next child put the doll outside the box. The next child puts the doll upside down. Continue like this until everyone has had a turn.

Language Development/Listening & Understanding; shows progress in understanding and following simple and multiple-step directions.

Discovery

Tell the children that you are going to try a watching experiment. Fill the glass with the ice cubes and then add water to the top. Put the glass out where it is visible to the children. Every few minutes, go and examine the glass, do you see any changes? (The glass should begin to sweat and the water drip out as the ice cubes begin to melt). Encourage the children to tell you what they see happening.

Science/Scientific Skills & Methods; begins to use senses and a variety of tools and simple measuring devices to gather information, investigate materials, and observe processes and relationships.

Music and Movement

Encourage the children to take turns practicing somersaults. Help them by telling them to put their hands next to their feet and to tuck in their chin. Some children may need a gentle push from an adult to help them get over.

Physical Health & Development/Health Status & Practices; progresses in physical growth, strength, stamina, and flexibility.

Play In The Pond. Mark a large area on the floor to be the pond (or use your group rug as the pond if there is room to stand beside it. Tell the children that when you say “In the pond”, everyone is to jump into the large marked off area. When you say,”Out of the pond”, everyone is to jump out of the marked area. Start by slowly saying in the pond, out of the pond. Try calling faster or saying in the pond two and three times in a row before saying out of the pond.

Language Development/Listening & Understanding; shows progress in understanding and following simple and multiple-step directions.

Do The Hokey Pokey with the children. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g11SI1nUcf8

You put your foot in, you put your foot out You put your foot in and you shake it all about. You do the hokey pokey and you turn yourself around That’s what it’s all about! Move up your body doing knees, hips, etc. Do your whole body last.

Language Development/Listening & Understanding; understands an increasingly complex and varied vocabulary.

Blocks

Ask the children to build structures and then put manipulatives inside and outside their structure. Manipulatives may include people, animals, or small cars.

Language Development/Listening & Understanding; understands an increasingly complex and varied vocabulary.

Art

Give each child a piece of white construction paper. Help them take strips of masking tape and tape from one side of the paper to the other. Give each child 3-6 strips of masking tape. Put out small containers of colored paint. Encourage the children to paint inside each shape made by the masking tape a different color. When the paint has dried, carefully pull the masking tape of f the paper. The result will be a stain glass type look with white between each color.

Language Development/Listening & Understanding; shows progress in understanding and following simple and multiple-step directions. AND Creative Arts/Art; develops growing abilities to plan, work independently, and demonstrate persistence in a variety of art projects.

Sand and Water

Fill the table up with water today and add a variety of containers. Challenge the children to see which container holds the most water. Show the children how to scoop with a measuring cup and count how many scoops it takes to fill a container. Can they guess which will hold the most water?

Mathematics/Number & Operations; develops increasing ability to count in sequence to 10 and beyond AND Mathematics/Number & Operations; begins to use language to compare numbers of objects with terms such as more, less, greater than, fewer, equal to. AND Science/Scientific Skills & Knowledge; begins to describe and discuss predictions, explanations, and generalizations based on past experiences.

Library and Writing

Give each child a piece of drawing paper that has a line drawn down the middle. Challenge the children to draw a picture of something that they like to do inside on one half and outside on the other. Write a their responses on the bottom of each half.

Literacy/Early Writing; begins to represent stories and experiences through pictures, dictation, and in play.

Dramatic Play

Suggest to the children that they play that they are going to town. What do they need to take with them? (purse, money, dressing up, food basket, car keys). Let them bring chairs into the center to make a car or truck to drive to town.

Math and Manipulatives

Place a hoola hoop on the floor (or make a masking tape square). Put a line back about 6 feet from the hoola hoop/square. Give a child 3-5 bean bags and ask them to see if they can throw them into the hoola hoop/square. After they have thrown their bean bags, have the child count how many are in the hoola hoop/ square and how many are outside. Have them hand the bean bags off to the next child. Older children can be encouraged to try to draw their results on a piece of paper.

Mathematics/Number & Operations; begins to make use of one-to-one correspondence in counting objects and matching groups of objects.

Outdoor Play

Bring out any boxes that you have been able to collect and allow the children to play inside and outside of them. Can they turn themselves upside down?

Social & Emotional Development/Cooperation; shows increasing abilities to use compromise and discussion in working, playing, and resolving conflicts with peers.

Transitions

Use one of your boxes and ask each child to find something of a particular color to put inside the box. (Aubrey can you find something red to put into the box, Alison can you find something green). For children who are just learning their colors you can give them a small piece of colored paper or a crayon in the color that you would like them to find.

Language Development/Listening & Understanding; shows progress in understanding and following simple and multiple-step directions. AND Mathematics/Geometry & Spatial Sense; shows growth in matching, sorting, putting in a series, and regrouping objects according to one or two attributes such as color, shape, or size.

Dear Parent- today we read a book about inside, outside, and upside down. Ask your child to show you what inside looks like using a closet or bedroom. (Can you put yourself inside the closet?) Ask your child to show you what outside and upside down look like also.