This week we studied the animals from the Arctic circle and Antarctica. (Goes along with the cold weather we've been having, and the nice couple inches of snow we got last night.) We started out each day locating the sticker animals that go in the Arctic and Antarctic. I purchased a book at an Usborne show last fall called, Animal Sticker Atlas. It comes with the stickers, completely out of order to put onto the maps. It was fun for the boys to look for that days stickers.
Both boys did lapbooks, but taking the advice of a friend, decided to try something different this time. Alex, since he is older, did more components and some harder minit books than Nicolas did. It was a little more work for me, but worked better. Alex wasn't sitting and waiting for Nicolas to get done with his book before we moved one, mostly because he could go ahead and work on a component that Nicolas was not going to do for his book. Because both books are different, I am posting pictures from both. The first one is Alex's:
Starting at the top left, the Alaska book, the only state in the US in the Arctic.
Below that, the penguin life cycle book:
Then the Whales/Fish venn diagram. Each flap opens to reveal what a whale has or does, what they both have in common, and finally what a fish has or does.
The bottom right is the anatomy of a polar bear.
Then opening one of the middle flaps down reveals a map of Antarctica and some more minit books.
Under the mape is Where do penguins live:
A seals book and extra pictures.
Then lifting the other middle flap up:
At the top, the life cycle of a whale:
The polar bear book tells what they eat:
The penguins tab book list: Appearance, Habitat, Food, Predators, and Reproduction:
And the wheel show other arctic animals:
Now, here is Nicolas's book. Some components are the same, so I will only show you what he did differently.
Starting at the top left, a yes/no penguin book. Do penguins have fur? Do penguins fly? Do penguins have knees? Do penguins have ears? (yes to knees and ears, no to fur and fly)
Beneath that are just pictures to fill in space. In the middle is the wheel with other animals of the arctic:
And beneath that is the penguin tab book that Alex did.
How do whales stay warm? book, both boys did, but here is Nicolas's book:
Beneath that is his Alaska book. Then we flip up the middle flap (Alex had two - one flipped up and the other flipped down. Nicolas only has one that flips up). We reveal the "Where do penguins live" that is the same as Alex's and a book about Seals.
The life cycle of a whale book is the same as Alex's and the Polar bear's eat book is the same except that Nicolas did not write in his. I had strips that he had to glue in.
We had a lot of fun with this book. We checked out a video from the library that was a National Geographic for kids about the polar regions. They make it fun, but also give lots of information. It was also fun to watch.