Hands On With Penguins

Our penguins unit is finally over :( But it was so fun to teach. We did some fun hands on experiments to truly understand some special features of penguins. We learned about how penguins stay warm with their layer of blubber by doing the ice test. They put one hand in the ice water and the other hand in the blubber bag to feel which hand was cold and which one was warmer. 

To make the blubber bag you'll need 2 gallon ziploc bags, packing tape, and a container of blubber. Spoon a ton of Crisco into one bag, then place the other bag inside, fold over the top and tape it down. VIOLA!

We also did an experiment to see how penguins keep their waxy feathers dry. I gave the kids their own piece of wax paper, a cut straw, and a cup of water. They were amazed that the water drop stayed perfectly on the paper and that they were able to physically move it around.

Since we were learning about penguins and weather/temperature, I gave the kids a cup of the ice water and then heated up water from the microwave so that they could play with the thermometers and watch the "red juice" lol move up and down depending on which water cup it was in. Complete amazement lol 

Throughout the week we labeled the body parts of our 4 foot emperor penguin.

Every time we finished reading any non-fiction books, we added new facts to our "like, can, have, are" poster. I would write their facts (as they helped me sound out the words) and then they got to illustrate each fact on a post it note. The loved the challenge of coming up with new facts for each column so that it wouldn't have room for more.