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4/8/2021

Mission: Namibia! Lesson Adaptations

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​Tips for Modifying Lessons for Distanced and Remote Learners!

​Each week, we provide two new lesson opportunities.  Some will be very easy to adapt to a distanced classroom setting while others may require a bit more thinking.  Remember, you can skip any lessons you choose and still provide your students with a great mission experience.  Even under normal conditions, it is rare that a class does EVERY lesson associated with a mission, so be kind to yourselves.  I'll add to this page weekly so you can find adaptation ideas for the lessons you DO choose to do. 

Day 1: To Namibia
In person with distancing: This lesson sets the stage for the mission and focuses on preparing for weather conditions.  For the main event of this lesson, use the printables provided and have students work with their own set of materials.  If you choose to use day light tracking extension in this lesson, consider having a class copy that only the teacher touches, or give each student a set of data pages to keep in their journals.
Remote learning:  If sharing printables is a challenge with your remote learners, challenge them to use real clothes and equipment and a real suitcase or backpack from their home.  They can share their work with photos or videos in your learning management system or during a class video call.
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Day 2: Sandboarding
​In person with distancing: In order to keep students more distanced during this lesson, have teams each build a segment of their sand slide and join them together at the end for testing.  Alternately, if weather permits, take this activity outside so that students can work together more safely.
Remote learning:  Students may not have enough toilet paper tubes on hand to create complex slides.  Encourage students to look for alternate slide building materials.  Try incorporating Hot-Wheels track. Create chutes from old cereal boxes.  Try other materials from the recycling bin.  They could also take the activity outdoors to a sand box or dirt pile!
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Day 3: Big Babies
In person with distancing: This lesson requires students to work together to assemble life-size baby animal poster puzzles.  To help with distancing, plan to have smaller groups with more poster puzzles.  Have one or more students take turns adding or changing the position of the pieces following the verbal directions from their team mates.  This will slow down assembly, but provide  an added opportunity for collaborative discussion and language development.
Remote learning: If you are not able to send posters home with students, modify this lesson so that students complete the Venn diagram portion of the lesson using the provided photos of adult and baby animals as a reference.
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Day 4: Lions and Zebras

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In person with distancing: This active game should be safe to play outdoors following your school safety protocols.  
Remote learning: Unless students have a large and willing family, this game will be difficult for remote learners to play.  Instead focus on descriptive language by adapting the kindergarten ELA integration for L.K.5.B.  (Have the students pretend to be different animals and follow the teacher‘s action directions (i.e. “run fast!” “stretch up high!”). Then, have students do the opposite of the teacher’s directions and use words to describe what they’re doing (e.g.,. if you say “run fast!” students should stand still. If you say “stretch up high” your students should bend down low).  The arts integration activity would be another great at-home activity.
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4/8/2021

Mission: Namibia! Vote Week 2

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Second vote for this mission!

We're always excited to see how students vote.  Some of you have even shared your students' rationale!  We love hearing about their thinking.  Grab a pdf of the hand out pictured here via the first button.  The second button will take you to a google form you can use with your students!  
click here to download the pdf
click to get this week's Google form to copy, adapt, and share
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4/8/2021

Mission: Namibia! Field Video Links

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​Share content though your learning management system

Each week, we'll post links to field videos on this page so you can push them to student devices or post to your learning management system without having to set up accounts or passwords for your students.

You can also send parents here to collect the links or copy and paste them and share via the platform of your choice.  The videos are also visible by clicking on the video thumbnail.  To ensure kids' safety, we advise teacher and parents not to share this page directly with your young students if they are unsupervised.  Children should also be supervised if watching videos or livestreams directly on the site.  ​

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Hypothesis Video
Hypothesis

​Dr. Jeff Muntifering wants us to do an animal count in Etosha National Park, Namibia to test his hypothesis that there are 30 to 40 herbivores for every  carnivore in Etosha. This will help him determine whether the wildlife population is healthy or unhealthy. We need your help!
link: bit.ly/HypothesisNamibia
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Day 1: To Namibia!
Beth and Curtis traveled all the way from Maine to Namibia. Join them on their journey and see how they prepare for THIS adventure!
​link: bit.ly/NamibiaFieldVideo1
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Day 3: Welcome to Etosha National Park!
Beth and Curtis finally arrived in Etosha National Park! They took a wild buggy ride and spotted their first herbivores and carnivores.
link: bit.ly/NamibiaFieldVideo3
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Day 2: School & Sand Dunes
Beth and Curtis visited a school that is working to help rhinos, then they explored force and motion in a really fun way!
link: bit.ly/NamibiaFieldVideo2
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Day 4: Orange Route
link: bit.ly/NamibiaFieldVideo4

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4/8/2021

Mission: Namibia! Comic Tips

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​Fun Suggestions for Building Literacy Skills!

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Each week we'll share helpful hints on using the comic across the grade level span.  I'll add each week's tips here so they are easy to find.  If you are new to the comic, be sure to share the backstory of the characters with your students.  You can watch the Backstory video on the comic page or read about it on the top of the comic page or click here to read the backstory and get a pdf version to share with parents!
If you need to share comic videos directly with students you can use these safe video links to do so:
  • Backstory: bit.ly/ComicBackstory
  • Week 1: bit.ly/NamibiaComic1
  • Week 2: bit.ly/NamibiaComic2

​Week 1
Pre K: Challenge your students use the pictures to tell this story!  What are Curiosity Cat and Data Dog doing?  What animals did they encounter?  After students make predictions, read the comic to them.  They can make sound effects along with you!

Kindergarten:  Our new comic series has plenty of reading and word study opportunities for your budding readers!  For our U.S. schools, you are nearing the end of the school year so your kinders have more skills now!  They'll be able to decode not only sound effects but find many familiar words throughout the comic.
Challenge students to find /oo/ words.  This week they'll find words with both /oo/ sounds (as in book and zoo).  Brainstorm and sort other /oo/ words!  
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~ Written by Curtis Bentley ~ Illustrated by Ben Matsuya ~
First Grade:  Young readers benefit from working on reading inflection.  Reading with feeling increases comprehension and it's FUN!  Equip your students with copies of the comic and have them highlight and color code ending punctuation (e.g., all periods yellow and all question marks orange).  Then challenge them to read just a single sentence with feeling to a partner.  Their partner should close their eyes and listen.  At the end of the sentence the listener must try to identify the punctuation of the sentence they just heard!

Second Grade:  Print the comic in little book form for this activity.  We've included more challenging words in the text boxes this week.  Have students mark the ones they find tricky, then write those on the back cover to create a mini glossary!  They can add definitions after they consult with friends or other resources to determine the meaning. 

Week 2
Pre K: Did you know even pre-readers can use details from text to support their claim?  When you share this week's comic with them have them tell you what they think made the tracks leading under the couch.  Then have them tell you why they think that!  What evidence in the pictures supports their idea?

Kindergarten:  This week's comic provides a great opportunity to do some word study focusing on vowels.  List each sound effect on a card.  (Pro Tip: Give this task to one of your early finishers prior to the activity!)  Then sort the words by vowel sounds:  short and oddballs!
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short vowels; pop, zop, zup, gulp, pip, sniff, gag
oddballs: boing, arf
What's left?  "Woof"  where does your class think it belongs?  Why?  You can build on the vowel work last week!  You can take this further and sort the short vowel words by sounds too.  Sorting and classifying helps children internalize language patterns and helps them be better readers AND spellers!

First and Second Grades:  As they year progresses, we've increased the reading challenges in the comic.  Many of the tricky words will be familiar by the end of the mission but may seem a bit daunting now.  Empower your readers by taking a moment to go on a big word hunt.  Arm your eager word hunters with highlighters and set them loose!  You call out a big word such as "herbivore" and challenge students to find it in the comic.  You can narrow the hunt by working with a single frame or increase the challenge by expanding to a full row or even the whole comic.  Continue with more words before reading the comic.  By previewing some of the tricky words, your students can have more confidence as they read the latest episode!

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4/8/2021

Mission: Namibia! Livestream Archives

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​​Need to share livestream archives with students?

This is the place!  At the end of each livestream day, we'll select one session to archive and post it on our Livestream Archive page AND post safe links here.

If your students are working remotely and you need to share our livestream archives with them, simply grab the link and share it through your learning management platform.  Each bit.ly link takes students to a video.link (formerly Safe YouTube) version of the archive. This version eliminates related content and other possible distractions.  If you need an alternate format, please drop us a line at Curious@Go2Science.com ​and we'll do our best to accommodate!  ​
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Day 1 Livestream
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Day 2 Livestream
Beth and Curtis kick off the latest mission from Namibia! Join them in Mobile HQ for a field video, motion break, word breakdowns, and student questions!
​link: bit.ly/NamibiaLIVE01
Curtis and Beth talk about their school visit and sand boarding excursion!  Join them for awesome questions and a thrilling motion motion break!
link: bit.ly/NamibiaLIVE02

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4/1/2021

Mission: Namibia! Vote Week 1

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​Help direct the mission!

​Etosha National Park is big!  Beth and Curtis will sample the wildlife population by looking in some areas of the park.  They are counting on YOU to decide where they should go to do their surveys.

​​Your students will direct our field research through voting about where we go and what we do!  Each week we'll provide a map and description of routes we could take as we test our hypothesis.  Giving students voice and choice in the mission is a great way to increase engagement and motivation!  Each class gets one vote.  Many teachers will use the vote as a class discussion or persuasive writing prompt as they build consensus and decide how to cast their vote.

Voting for Week 1 will close on Thursday, April 8, 2021 at 4PM (EST).  Use the button below to grab a pdf version of the vote choices to project or share with students.
click here to download the pdf
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​​Distance Learning Help!

click to get this week's Google form to copy, adapt, and share
​​Google forms are a handy way to remotely engage with students.  Each week, we'll provide an interactive form you can copy and share with students to get their feedback on the vote!
If you choose to use our google form with your students, be sure to MAKE A COPY and not send the link shared via our button or your responses will be viewable by all and you won't be able to easily see your student answers.
​If you need directions about how to make a copy of the google form, check out the bottom of our previous blog post (click here) for step by step directions! ​
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4/1/2021

Mission: Namibia! Supplemental Content

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Mini Curtis, bingo boards, animal cards, and more all in one spot!

Investigating a Go2Science hypothesis can be a simple as watching the 3-5 minute hypothesis video, then watching and discussing the twelve 5-6 minute field videos.  However, we provide loads of ways to take learning farther.  Our lessons, livestream, voting, 3D printing, comics, music videos, and publishing live right on the the Go2Science website.  However, our BONUS content can only be found on this page!

Bingo Boards!

​Hone observation skills by challenging students to be on the look out for specific animals through out the mission. 
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Click to download Bingo Board
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Animal Cards
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Print a set for use in a pocket chart.  Print two sets to create a memory matching game.  There are so many possibilities for these colorful cards!
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Click to download Namibia Animal cards
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Animal Survey Sheets
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Double check data or keep notes on the animals we see with these animal lists organized by carnivores, herbivores, and others!
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Click to download checklists
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Mini Curtis!​

Attention livestreamers! Mini Curtis​ will be hiding in Mobile HQ this mission.  He will be in a different place for each livestream.  Download our recording page to track his locations. 
​PLUS print your own Mini Curtis for MORE adventures! 
Click to download Mini Curtis and tracking page!
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Word Wall and Vocabulary

​Our word wall cards and master vocabulary list can be downloaded below or on the Go2Science website ( Weekly Materials page). 
​Check out our blog post about working with words to learn more about why vocabulary development matters.
Click for word cards
Click for vocabulary list
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2/16/2021

Story Time with Beth and Curtis!

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Join us for some awesome stories!

We are a bit sad that our work in Borneo is done but you can continue the adventure with a pair of books about Borneo!  We also heard from many of you that Go2Science has been the hook to lure your students into your remote classrooms during COVID 19 school closures.  Curtis and I found some books in Borneo we thought your students would enjoy .  So we've created some virtual read-aloud sessions for you to share with students and keep them engaged for a few more weeks of distance learning.  Enjoy!
The Wild Treehouse of Borneo is about a boy named Toobi who helps some animals in his own backyard.  What animals live in your backyard and how can you protect or create habitat for them?

Safe Link: bit.ly/WildTreehouse
I Belong to the Forest chronicles the life of a sun bear that was taken from the forest to be a pet. Wild animals belong in the wild! What do you think will happen to this sun bear?
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Safe Link: bit.ly/BelongToForest
We are THRILLED that the folks at The Innovation Press granted permission for us to share one of their beautiful books with you as a virtual read aloud!  FUNGUS IS AMONG US! is a great tie in to our recent Biodiversity mission in Borneo.  I love that it spotlights a real mycologist, Dr. Sara Branco!  (Yes, I followed her on twitter!)
FUNGUS IS AMONG US! is an informative and whimsical look at the fabulous world of fungi! A delightful rhyming story is coupled with cool facts.  It ends with a Q & A section with a mycologist, Dr. Sara Branco!

Safe Link: bit.ly/FungusStory

If you joined us for the Kenyan Groundwater mission, this story is for you!  The main character is from Sudan, but her plight is very similar to the water challenges they had at HIP Academy.
Nya's Long Walk is about a girl named Nya who lives in Sudan.  Her village has trouble with water.  It reminded us of our good friends in Kenya!

Safe Link: bit.ly/NyasLongWalk

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2/11/2021

Mission: Penguins? Livestream Archives

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​Need to share livestream archives with students?

This is the place!  At the end of each livestream day, we'll select one session to archive and post it on our archive page AND post safe links here.

If your students are working remotely and you need to share our livestream archives with them, simply grab the link and share it through your learning management platform.  Each bit.ly link takes students to a video.link (formerly Safe YouTube) version of the archive. This version eliminates related content and other possible distractions.  If you need an alternate format, please drop us a line at Curious@Go2Science.com ​and we'll do our best to accommodate!  
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Day 1 Livestream
Beth and Curtis kick off the winter mission.  Join them in mobile head quarters for a motion break, vocabulary building, and lots of awesome student questions!
Safe Link: bit.ly/PenguinLIVE01
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Day 2 Livestream
Join Beth and Curtis in Mobile HQ for a rather soggy motion break! Plus there's a word breakdown, new field video, and lots of awesome student questions!
​Safe Link: bit.ly/PenguinLIVE02
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Day 3 Livestream
Join Curtis and Beth in mobile headquarters as they talk about the latest field video! Learn about Darwin's Finches, sea lions, and more. There are lots of interesting student questions and some great thinking about the evidence! As always, there is a motion break and word break down.
Safe Link: bit.ly/PenguinLIVE03
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Day 4 Livestream
Curtis and Beth are back in mobile headquarters to answer your questions, learn new words, get the wiggles out AND learn about the most powerful tool ever invented!  There is lots of fun, motion, and learning.
Safe Link: bit.ly/PenguinLIVE04
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Day 5 Livestream
Beth and Curtis are back to answer student questions!  Beth compares Curtis to the sea lion they found sleeping on a bench.  They talk about estimation and have a silly swim!
Safe Link: bit.ly/PenguinLIVE05
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Day 6 Livestream
We are already halfway through our mission!  Celebrate with a special motion break!!!  Of course, there are still questions, exciting new words, and a field video!  Join in on the active learning and fun!
Safe Link: bit.ly/PenguinLIVE06
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Day 7 Livestream
Beth and Curtis answer questions about their explorations at Kicker Rock, including a sighting of a beautiful Galapagos shark.  Tune in to learn a bit about neural buoyancy too!
Safe Link: bit.ly/PenguinLIVE07
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Day 8 Livestream
Curtis and Beth are back in Mobile HQ to answer lots of student questions about Blue-footed Boobies!  They are such interesting birds.
Safe Link: bit.ly/PenguinLIVE08
BONUS read aloud: bit.ly/FUNGUSbook
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Day 9 Livestream
Beth and Curtis have lots of fun answering thoughtful student questions, taking a fun motion break, deconstructing a word into phonemes, and looking at a very interesting skull!
​Safe Link: bit.ly/PenguinLive09
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Day 10 Livestream
Curtis and Beth have talk about lava and a very unusual forest.  They also share their very rough ride to a new island with an active motion break.  Join the fun!

Safe Link: bit.ly/PenguinLIVE10
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Day 11 Livestream
Join Beth and Curtis in mobile HQ to learn about how animals rafted to the Galapagos islands long ago AND to hear about the unusual way frigatebirds sometimes get a meal!  There is a motion break and student questions too!
Safe Link: bit.ly/PenguinLIVE11
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Day 12 Livestream
Safe Link: bit.ly/PenguinLIVE12

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2/4/2021

Mission: Penguin? Comic Tips

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Fun Suggestions for Building Literacy Skills!

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Each week we'll share helpful hints on using the comic across the grade level span.  I'll add each week's tips here so they are easy to find.  If you are new to the comic, be sure to share the backstory of the characters with your students.  You can read that at the top of the comic page or click here to read the backstory and get a pdf version to share with parents!

If you need to share comic videos directly with students you can use these safe video links to do so:
  • Backstory: bit.ly/ComicBackstory
  • Week 1: bit.ly/PenguinComic_1
  • Week 2: bit.ly/PenguinComic_2
  • Week 3: bit.ly/PenguinComic_3
  • Week 4: bit.ly/PenguinComic_4
  • Week 5: bit.ly/PenguinComic_5
  • Week 6: bit.ly/PenguinComic_6

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Week 1
This week's tips work across the grade level span and give you a bit of info about general use of the comics to support literacy.  
Build Prior Knowledge  When used along with the other mission materials, your students will already have some prior knowledge to support comprehension. It is also helpful to ask students what they already know about things like cats and dogs, real and imaginary, or for Week 1, volcanoes and whales to build a web of understanding that can help them understand new ideas.
One document, multiple levels!  Each comic episode supports pre-readers to upper level second grade readers.  The graphic format encourages all readers to stretch their abilities by tackling juicy words and big concepts!  
  • Pre-readers can read the pictures to tell the story.
  • Typical kindergarten readers can work to sound out the sound effects.  It's way more fun than reading lists of nonsense words!
  • First graders are likely to find success reading speech and thought bubbles.
  • The text boxes at the bottom of the comic will give most second graders something to chew on!

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Click to download mini flip chart
Week 2
Pre K:  Pre-readers can build skills as they "read the pictures"  of the comic.  Encourage students to use dramatic story language and sound effects.  Print the little book format and support children as needed to find the front cover and turn pages one at a time.
Kindergarten:  Focus on those tricky short vowel sounds using the sound effects this week!  Change the short vowel sounds in these words to create your own sound effects! 
a: lap
i: pip, hiss
o: pop, blop, zop
u: zup
Download, print, and assemble our sound substitution mini flip chart for more fun!
First Grade:  This is the time of year when some children start to zoom ahead in reading while others are taking their time with early reader books as they build a strong foundation at their own pace.  Try using the comic for a readers theater!  Those zoomers can read the text boxes, your foundation builders can do sound effect, kiddos in the middle can read the speech bubbles and EVERYONE can feel successful as they work on fluency and phrasing!
Second Grade:  You may notice we've snuck a few tricky words into the text boxes.  Your students can begin to integrate their use of context cues to puzzle out some of that richer vocabulary!  This is also a great way for those clever advancing readers to begin to work on making inferences!  Why does Data Dog need to be careful?  Why is there a smell of rotten eggs?  ​

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Week 3

Pre K
:  Young children can benefit from reading expressions.  Noticing the feelings conveyed in the illustrations will help build the foundation for drawing inferences.  Have your students tell you how the characters feel in each frame and why they think they feel that way.  What evidence can they point to in the pictures to support their opinions?  


Kindergarten:  Playing with words by substituting phonemes at the beginning, middle, and end of words helps both reading AND spelling skills.  Before you introduce the comic, take a moment to play!  Write "zoom" on a whiteboard.  After children read it, erase the /m/ and challenge children to make other sound effects by adding different final sounds!  You can follow the same protocol with "zup," this time changing the middle phoneme or vowel sound.  
Medial phoneme substitutions: /z/ /u/ /p/ to /z/ /o/ /p/
Final phoneme substitutions: /z/ /oo/ /m/ to /z/ /oo/ /p/
First Grade:  Now that your students are more established readers, it might be a good time to focus on reading with inflection.  Challenge students to notice the end punctuation in each speech or thought bubble.  How would the character say those words?  Using voices for each character can further reinforce this skill.
Second Grade:  Some of the text boxes give facts and information while others describe the action in the frame or something out of view.  Have students identify which type of text is in each box.  You can color code them and then have teams assigned for choral reading for a specific text type! 

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Week 4
Pre K:  Print the full page version of the comic and attach each page to a a sheet of 12" x 18" construction paper. Look at the pictures in each panel of the comic.  Ask students to dictate a word or phrase would to describe the characters or actions in each panel and record those on the construction paper.  Bind all the pages in a book to read together!
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Kindergarten:  Word keys can help unlock patterns in reading and spelling.  Our sound effects this week provide a great springboard for exploring the /up/ /op/ and /ap/ keys.  Create mini books for these word families using the corresponding comic pane for a cover.  For example, use page 7 as a cover for a book about /op/ and have students illustrate rhyming words like: mop, top, stop, or hop to create a mini book!
First Grade:  Expand on last week's work with character voices and inflection by reading with voice effects!  You'll notice that Data Dog has both speech and thought bubbles.  When reading aloud, have students read the thought bubbles holding a cup in front of their mouths to give their voice a far away and thoughtful quality!  It's not only fun, it helps increase attention to details in text.
Second Grade:  Go on an action word hunt!  Armed with only a copy of the comic and a highlighter, challenge students to see how many action words they can highlight in the text boxes.  Take it to the next level to see if they can brainstorm synonyms for those actions words.  Does the sentence have the same meaning with their new words.  How does word choice affect tone and meaning?  It's a fun way to explore this writing concepts without the daunting task of revising their own original work!

Week 5
Pre K:  Have your students take turns acting out the comic as you read it!  Students can make the sound effects of the different animals as they pantomime the action.  The frigate bird says "ack."  The penguins say, "hee haw."  And the tortoise does not say much at all...though it can make quiet hissing and munching sounds!
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Kindergarten: Phonemic awareness and phonological processing skills are an important foundational literacy skills.  They can be fun to practice too!  This activity is bound to be a hit with your more kinesthetic learners!  Make a list of the sound effects in this week's comic.  Next create a physical pattern that the class can turn into a rhythm such as {stomp, stomp, clap}.  Once everyone can join in on creating the rhythm in unison, select one of the sound effects from your list.  The goal of this game is to keep the pattern going while saying as many real or nonsense words that rhyme with the selected word as you can.  Start the rhythm:
{stomp, stomp, clap} {stomp, stomp, clap} {stomp, stomp, clap}
Start the rhyming chain with one of the words from the list, e.g. zup.  Continue the pattern and challenge students to add new words at regular intervals like this: {stomp, stomp, clap} cup {stomp, stomp, clap} mup {stomp, stomp, clap} pup {stomp, stomp, clap} flup {stomp, stomp, clap} sup.  The rhyming chain brakes when the rhythm is interrupted or you run out of rhymes!  Whoever broke the chain starts the next one!
First and Second Grade: Use the comic as a springboard for writing!  Challenge students to write their own comic panels.  Try using our template.  Students can create their own illustration.  Then write in the text box.  Each page has speech and thought bubbles students can write in then cut out and add to their comic frame.  Simply add more pages as needed!  Our illustrator, Ben, tells us that most comics try to tell the story with just three speech bubbles per panel!  It is tricker than you think.  Comics can be a hook for reluctant writers as it breaks up the task of writing into bite sized bits.  Your budding novelists (you know the ones...they use the word "very" a LOT!) can gain self editing skills as they decide what must be written and what can go!
Click to download comic template
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Week 6
Pre K:  Have students take turns reading the pictures to tell the story.  Provide props like Omni Glasses (try 3D printing ours), a rolled up drawing, suitcases, books about animals, and stuffed animals.  Have children make up their own adventures!
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Kindergarten:  There's lots of pressure to get kids reading earlier than ever, often in direct opposition to what we know about child development.  So what's the conscientious teacher to do?  Work on skills in a way that honors the developmental needs of young children!  A rhyming relay is one way to do that. Here's how to play: 
  1. Select some words from the comic, such as all the sound effects ending in /p/. 
  2. Next have students brainstorm words that rhyme with each word they selected from the comic.  (pop: bop, drop, cop, stop, mop, hop, kerplop, zop, etc.)  Depending on the needs of your students you might write each word on a card.
  3. Split the class into relay teams and select a rhyme captain for each team.  This is a good role for a child who is very good at rhyming.
  4. Have each team form a line on one side of the room and position the rhyming captain for each team opposite that team's line on the other side of the room.  
  5. Begin play by giving the first child in line for each relay team a word (or word card) then have that student move to the other side of the room in any manner you choose. (skip, hop, crawl, crab walk, whatever!)
  6. When that child reaches the rhyme captain, they must say a word that rhymes with the one they've been given.  The captain confirms the rhyme and sends the child back to their team with the new word (either in their memory or with a word card.)
  7. The next child in the line takes the new word to the rhyme captain and then produces a new rhyming word for the captain to confirm.  
  8. Repeat steps six and seven until the first team gets back to their first rhymer.​
First Grade:  Students have practiced using a cup to create a "thinking" voice.  Brainstorm other voices for the new characters in the comic this week.  What will Darwin's voice sound like?  How about Curtis and Beth?  Then challenge students to read the speech bubbles using character voices.
Second Grade: Now that you have the full set of comics, you can set up a multimedia readers theater performance of the full story!  Project each comic behind your readers and invite other classes or parents to come see your performance.  Of course, no costuming is necessary in reader's theater, but if your class is so inclined they could even create simple props or costumes.  You can give everyone a role by having multiple sea lion pups, tortoises, and penguins.  
All grades:  Try your hand at drawing finches or other birds in your area!  Be sure to notice tiny details and include them in your drawings.

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    Meet Beth and Curtis!

    Presidential Award-Winning teacher and hula hoop fanatic, Beth loves bringing real world science to kids! Beth is fascinated by engineering challenges, technology, and outdoor learning spaces. After 25 years teaching kindergarten, she’s excited to share her passion and experience on-line with classrooms from around the world!

    Curtis is a lot of things: a scientist, lawyer, explorer, drummer and Ironman. His brain is always churning. His paleontological finds are in museums across the country and he even has an extinct sea turtle named after him. He loves traveling the world and immersing himself in new environments and cultures. Curtis finds joy in sparking the imagination of young learners and making them think in new ways.

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