The beautiful pictures in this book introduce children to the variety of eggs and teaches about their colors, shapes, sizes, and textures. Along the way it gives information into many of the eggs that oviparous animals lay.
Materials
- Two hard boiled egg
- Plastic eggs
- 2 small stones, several moistened water beads, 2 bottle tops filled with school glue, 2 bits of paper, 2 bits of sandpaper
- blanket or box big enough for a child to crouch inside
- Balance Scale
- Cleaned egg cartons. Ask parents to save for you, the more the merrier
Vocabulary
- Shapely (to have a pleasing shape)
- Incubate (to sit on an egg in order for it to hatch)
- Tubular (long, round, and hollow like a tube. Show children a toilet paper roll that you will use in art)
- Clever (to be good at something like camouflaging)
- Camouflage (to blend into one’s environment)
- Textured (rough and smooth are textures)
- Gooey (sticky like school glue or honey)
- Yolk (The yellow or orange part of the egg, it gives food to the baby inside)
- Albumen (The white part of the egg, is like a pillow to protect the baby inside)
- Hatch (to break out of the egg)
- Oviparous (Animals that hatch from eggs)
- Fossilized (when something alive dies and becomes hard as a rock, such as a dinosaur egg)
- Transformation (to change from one shape to another)
Before Reading the Story
Put the hard boiled egg into a small cloth or paper bag and bring to your circle time. Hold the bag up and tell the children that today you are going to read about something that is inside your bag. Hold the bag up so the children can see how small the bag is. Allow them to guess what is inside. When they guess, or you have given them a moment to guess, pull the egg out and show it to them. Ask the children if they can name the shape of the egg and the color. Ask them if they think all eggs look alike? Open the book to the cover page and show them all the different kinds of eggs and explain that these are pictures of the many kinds of eggs that are laid by their mothers. So many kinds of eggs, let’s read and find out. Introduce the book.
Approaches to Learning/Reasoning & Problem Solving; develops increasing abilities to classify, compare and contrast objects, events, and experiences. AND Mathematics/Geometry & Spatial Sense; begins to recognize, describe, compare, and name common shapes, their parts and attributes.
Reading the Story
On the page where it states,”An egg is colorful” stop and point to several eggs asking is anyone wearing the color blue like this egg? Is anyone wearing speckles or spots like this egg? Look at this tiny egg, is anyone wearing yellow like this egg? On the page where the author says eggs can be clever, ask the children if they know what this means? Explain that an egg is clever because it knows how to hide in plain sight. When something is hiding in plain sight it is called camouflage. Ask the children if they can see the camouflaged eggs on the page? On the page where eggs come in different sizes, stop and ask a child to come up and hold their hand over the ostrich egg to help children see how big eggs can be.
Language Development/Listening & Understanding; understands an increasingly complex and varied vocabulary.
After Reading the Story
Ask the children to share with you something they learned about eggs from the story. Write their responses down on a piece of paper that you can later hang on the wall. Bring out your hard boiled egg again and tell the children that sadly there is no animal growing inside this egg but that you want to show them the different parts of the egg. Open the book back to the page where it says, An egg is giving. Hold your egg up and ask the children if they know what this outside part is called (shell)? Tell the children that the shell is the animals home. Peel the egg and ask the children if they remember the name of the white of the egg (albumen)? Repeat that this is the pillow that protects the egg. Use a butter knife to cut the egg in half and ask the children if they recall what the yellow part of the egg is called (yolk)? Remind them that this is where the animal inside would get its food. Rename and point to each part of the egg and encourage the children to repeat the name after you.
Language Development/Listening & Understanding; understands an increasingly complex and varied vocabulary. AND Science/Scientific Knowledge; expands knowledge of and abilities to observe, describe, and discuss the natural world, materials, living things, and natural processes.
Discovery
Make copies of the different oviparous animals that lay eggs. Put them inside the plastic eggs. The children can then open the eggs and name the animal inside. Encourage them to say the sentence; This oviparous animal is a ______.
Language Development/Speaking & Communicating; uses an increasingly complex and varied spoken vocabulary.
In the book it says that eggs are textured. Add textures to the center for the children to feel and name. (hard like a stone, soft and rubbery like a moistened water bead, gooey like a bit of school glue in a bottle top, smooth like a piece of paper, and rough like sandpaper.
Language Development/Speaking & Communicating; uses an increasingly complex and varied spoken vocabulary. AND 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.
If you are lucky, bring in a real bird nest (eggs not included) for the children to examine. Bring in frog eggs (found in larger puddles or shorelines in the spring).
Science/Scientific Knowledge; expands knowledge of and abilities to observe, describe, and discuss the natural world, materials, living things, and natural processes.
Music and Movement
Teach the children the poem, Peck, Peck, Peck.
Peck, peck, peck
On the warm brown egg.
Out comes a foot,
Out comes a leg.
How does the chick who’s not been about,
Discovery the secret on how to get out?
(Have the children take turns getting inside the box/under the blanket and pretend to hatch).
Language Development/Listening & Understanding; demonstrates increasing ability to attend to and understand conversations, stories, songs, and poems.
Teach the children the song, Everything I Always Say to the chorus of Pop Goes the Weasel. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sazc2J5MO7M
Everything I always say,
You always say the opposite.
When I say up,
You say down.
(include opposites quiet/noisey, rough/smooth, large/small)
Language Development/Speaking & Communicating; progresses in ability to initiate and respond appropriately in conversation and discussion with peers and adults.
Hatching Chickens fingerplay
5 eggs and 5 eggs are underneath the hen. Hold up one hand and then the other
5 eggs and 5 eggs and that makes 10. Hold up all 10 fingers
The hen keeps the eggs warm for 3 long weeks, Hold up 3 fingers
Then snap goes the shells with tiny little beaks. Snap fingers
Crack, crack the shells go, the chicks everyone Clap 4 times
Fluff out their feathers in the warm spring sun. Wiggle fingers
Mathematics/Number & Operations; begins to associate number concepts, vocabulary, quantities, and written numbers in meaningful ways.
While doing opposites, put on Hap Palmer’s song about Slow and Fast and let the children move accordingly. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_0bKHPEll_Q
Language Development/Listening & Understanding; shows progress in understanding and following simple and multiple-step directions.
Blocks
Add cleaned and empty egg cartons to the center for the children to add to their building today.
Approaches to Learning/Initiative & Curiosity; approaches tasks and activities with increased flexibility, imagination, and inventiveness.
Art
Make large egg shapes to put at the easel today. Give the children toilet paper tubes to dip in the paint and stamp onto the egg.
Creative Arts/Art; develops growing abilities to plan, work independently, and demonstrate care and persistence in a variety of art projects.
Use play dough today to play Transformation. Give each child a bit of playdough and ask them to roll it into a long snake shape. When they have done this, say “Transformation! now change it into a sphere/ball shape”. Transform again into a cube, oval, flattened. Between each shape change say “transformation”!
Language Development/Listening & Understanding; shows progress in understanding and following simple and multiple-step directions. AND Physical Health & Development/Fine Motor Skills; grows in hand-eye coordination in building with blocks, putting together puzzles, copying and reproducing shapes and patterns, stringing beads, and using scissors.
Library and Writing
Use the sequence cards to tell the story of the chicken eggs and the grocery store. https://www.aeb.org/images/PDFs/Educators/gk-hens-and-eggs.pdf
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.
Sand and Water
Add dampened dirt, grass clippings, pieces of straw, yarn, small sticks, etc. to allow the children to sculpt out bird nests.
Creative Arts/Art; gains ability in using different art media and materials in a variety of ways for creative expression and representation.
Dramatic Play
Add clean empty egg cartons, plastic eggs, an egg whip, egg beater, spatula, and small frying pan to the center today.
Social & Emotional Development/Cooperation; shows increasing abilities to use compromise and discussion in working, playing, and resolving conflicts with peers.
Math and Manipulatives
Use the balance scale today to see how many cubes a hard boiled eggs weighs. If you do not have cubes, use another small manipulative. If you do not have a balance scale, you can make one using a hanger. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tK8mSIEtTUw
Mathematics/Patterns & measurement; shows progress in using standard and non-standard measures for length and area of objects.
Cut out many egg shapes in yellow, green, blue, and red. Use these for pattern making or for simple addition problems (2 blue eggs + 1 red egg = how many eggs in total?
Mathematics/Patterns & Measurement; enhances abilities to recognize, duplicate, and extend simple patterns using a variety of materials. AND Mathematics/Number & Operations; develops increased ability to combine, separate, and name “how many” concrete objects.
Outdoor Play
Have the children walk across a balance beam, we use the edges of our sandbox. Tell the children that as they walk alligator or shake eggs are hatching so do not fall! Can the children walk forward foot over foot, backwards, or slide across the balance beam?
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
Ahead of time, hide various colored paper eggs around the room so that they blend with the environment a brown egg in blocks, a red egg on a red plate in dramatics). Remind the children that in the book the author talked about some eggs that camouflage into their environment. Show the children the picture of the tern egg hidden among the rocks. Tell the children that there are eggs hiding in the classroom. Let the children look for the eggs. When they find one bring it to you and have them name the color. This is a fun transition from outside to preparing for lunch or from waking from nap to going into centers.
Approaches to Learning/Engagement & Persistence; grows in abilities to persist in and complete a variety of tasks, activites, projects, and experiences.
Resources
Dear Parents, We have just finished reading a book about the many different kinds of eggs there are. Next time you go to the grocery store, take a moment and show your child the difference between small, medium, large, and extra large eggs!
Pictures of oviparous animals and their eggs
Book Play Everyday 
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