![]() This is also a great time to do a life cycle cut and paste, my favorite for this unit is the Polar Bear Life cycle! For students who need a more challenge, they must write complete sentences. For struggling students, they simply draw and label. I like to have students compare a mother animal and a baby animal using an interactive journal (seen on the left). These are PERFECT for when students are ready to become a little more independent. Interactive Animal Mothers and Babies Journals You can easily differentiate this activity by having students draw, label or even write complete sentences. I love the freedom that it gives me as a teacher to lead the discussion where I need it to go, but I also love that it gives students an opportunity to get really creative. I love using prompts like the one you see on the left on the “Mothers and Babies” worksheet. This is a great opportunity to informally start comparing how young animals look like their parents (coloration, number of limbs and body structure). The best way to start this unit on Animal Mothers and Babies is to do a simple matching activity where you match a picture of the young animal with the mother animal. These activities are completed at the beginning of the unit when students are just starting to build their knowledge base, so these activities might seem easy, but remember, they are BUILDING their knowledge on the subject. We are then recording that new information on a simple recording sheet. This is where I introduce new vocabulary and I am “guiding” students through books or videos to find new information. Okay, “Guided Research” sounds like a super formal term… but what it really means is that these are the activities that we do together as a class and there is typically a right or wrong answer. This photo gallery celebrates some of those amazing animals who, in their own unique ways, dedicate themselves to motherhood.Learning the Facts about Animal Mothers and Babies One thing that most all animal mothers have in common is sacrifice nature doesn’t make it easy to nurture the next generation. ![]() “Many species seem to recognize that the young really don’t know what they are doing,” says animal behavioralist Jennifer Verdolin, author of the book Raised by Animals, “so they are given a kind of grace period to learn.” ( Read how animal mothers remind us a lot of our own.) But moms also have to teach their young how to be a monkey, a cheetah, a whale, or a falcon. Just keeping babies alive long enough to reach adulthood is a challenge. Some mothers, like octopuses, sacrifice their lives to give the next generation its start. Lion moms may live with their daughters for life, harp seals must cram every bit of their maternal care into less than two weeks, and many lizards never meet their offspring at all. Mother-child bonding runs the gamut of relationship styles. Some moms have dedicated co-parents, but others have to go it alone-or even contend with infanticidal killers. Many moms are on their own, but a fortunate few get help from babysitters or nursemaids. Some mothers lay eggs, in treetops or on the seafloor, while others labor through long pregnancies and live births. But the animal kingdom’s many mothering methods are as different as orangutans and octopuses. They also teach them the skills needed for life on the ice, including how to swim, hunt, and prepare dens for their own future families.Įvery animal can thank a mom for making life possible. Moms dote on their cubs for two to three years, protecting them from threats including male polar bears. Depending on where in the Arctic they call home, polar bear moms may remain in their snowy dens for up to eight months without eating or drinking.Ĭubs, often twins, spend their several months in their den, enjoying their mom's high-fat milk. ![]() Then, only those females who've successfully fattened up over a summer of hunting will begin to bear young.ĭuring those months of plenty, a bear may gain more than 220 pounds, and mothers need every bit of those reserves when it's time to den. Polar bears mate in the spring but don't become pregnant until the fall. A polar bear mom rests after nursing in Wapusk National Park in Manitoba, Canada. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |