What the heck is a naked mole rat?

Yes, there is such a thing as a naked mole rat. I thought it was just a made up character by Mo Willems, but we checked into it and they really do exist. We learned about zoo animals this week. Each day I taught them about a different animal. We watched the animal on a web cam, read books about the animal, and created a craft to represent the animal. I was totally surprised to find that there is a naked mole rat web cam that is sponsored by the National Zoo. So, we watched the web cam (they are nasty little things with the face only a mother could love), we read Naked Mole Rat Gets Dressed by Mo Willems, and then we dressed our naked mole rats. The students liked this animal the best of all. Do you see a pattern here? Underwear...NAKED mole rats....hmmm!?!? After they dressed their mole rat, they filled in the frame "My naked mole rat is a ___.".  These turned out so cute! Here are some pictures...and they are actually upright!


My naked mole rat is a girl.
My naked mole rat is a clown.




My naked mole rat is a princess.
My naked mole rat is a cowboy.














The other animals that I did were giraffes, pandas, tigers and lions.
We read Giraffes Can't Dance and created a paper bag puppet giraffe.
For pandas I did a directional art activity and read Panda Kindergarten.
We made a paper plate lion and I read The Lion and the Mouse.
I read Leo the Late Bloomer and we painted a tiger.
Sorry, I didn't take pictures of these...

Underwear....tee hee hee!

Yes, we had U week at school! This is always the student's favorite week because to learn the letter U all we talk about is underwear. There are always giggles when anyone says the word "underwear".  I read them the books Underwear and Dinosaurs Love Underwear...as you can imagine, I am asked to reread these books ALOT during the week. They are both hilarious stories about animals & dinosaurs that love to wear underwear. After reading these stories a few times during the week we talk about how the illustrator designed all the underwear. Some underwear has bananas, palm trees, rainbows, bones, stripes, etc. The students are then asked to pick a pair of underwear (girls pick between panties & bloomers, boys pick between briefs & boxers) and they design their own underwear with matching undershirts. After they have completed their underwear masterpieces, they write in the frame, "My underwear has..." . Of course, we hang our funny underwear in the hallway for all to see. Then, we write a letter to the principal asking her to come down and check out our underwear! Here are a few examples of our underwear...I really wish these would rotate so they could be viewed easier! UGH!

This is the display in the hallway.

Pizza underwear

Balloon underwear

Heart underwear

Star underwear