Sprinking Literacy Around the Classroom

In our classroom I look for opportunities to add literacy prompts in different spaces. After noticing that children spent a lot of time observing the aquarium, I hoped to capitalize on this interest and transform it into a richer experience. Next to the tank I added vocabulary cards, writing tools, and a clipboard with fishy outlines.

Children were encouraged to observe the fish in the tank and draw what they saw, or decorate the fish outline however they liked. Some recalled the book The Rainbow Fish and created that character using the template. Others were interested in the vocabulary cards and spent time reading them and then copying the print onto their fish papers. 

 

To reignite interest, I am adding papers with snail outlines this week as there are also brightly coloured water snails in our tank. As the days pass I will observe our classroom and see where else kids gravitate and add prompts and tools to those areas to further the literacy experiences. 

 

Click here for free downloadable copies of the vocabulary and templates to add to your own aquarium area.  

 

 

I Spy Snails

Miss J had her backyard taken over by snails this week and took a photo to show the children. We posted it in our science area and challenged the children to count how many snails they could spy!

Here is the photo. 

Looking and counting...

Recording our guess...

Exploring Snails

We had some snails on the table today for the children to explore. 

We encouraged the children to record their observations on a piece of large, communal butcher paper covering the table. 

The children had lots to say about their experiences and were eager to share their observations with one another. 

Look Who Came to School Today!

The children were so interested to observe the small snail today. It was very active eating the leaves and cucumbers we gave it and this prompted a lot of conversation. 

We created a display with reading and writing materials in order to encourage research regarding our visitor. 

More Snails

Look who came to school today!

Bye Bye Little Snail!

After observing our little snail for a week in our classroom snailarium, we decided to return the creature to where we found him (or her). We discussed with the children how it's important to return living things to where they were first found so that they are back in their natural habitat. Since our snail came from near the hostas along the front path of the school, that's where it was returned.

Slimy Snails!

Mrs. Cipkar brought us a snail she found on her walk today! We were so excited!

After safely putting the snail in our terrarium, we found some helpful books from the library. We researched our snail and found out many interesting things! Our snail was a garden snail, it eats leaves, it is slimy, it creeps along on a long body part called a 'foot' and can hide its body in its shell. Garden snails like to stay wet, but do not live in water.

We wrote out some of these neat snail facts to post near our new snail-arium!

Once we knew what out snail liked, we went on a hunt in the yard (where Mrs. Cipkar found it) to find things to add to the snail-arium to make our snail happy and comfortable.

We added these things from the school yard to the snail-arium and many children spent much time this afternoon admiring our new friend!