Amplify Grade 1 Knowledge Unit 8: Animals and Habitats Celebration Ideas

Unit 8 Animals and Habitats is next Amplify Knowledge series, This is a unit my students eagerly await each year. I mean, who doesn't love learning about wild animals?

It is also a great unit for incorporating science experiments and LOTS of read aloud!

Gallery

This unit has so many incredible image cards, so I create picture galleries around the room.

These galleries help support their writing in their habitat journals too.

We build a giant habitat chart on our wall throughout the unit.

Animals and Habitats gallery wall for first grade

The chart compares the 7 habitats by climate, water, ground, plants, animals and adaptations.

Animals and Habitats Student Book

Animals and Habitats book Amplify 1st grade

The gallery wall helps to support my students when they creating their own Habitat book throughout the unit.

Each habitat has its own page where students can record what they learned about the habitats climate, water, ground, plants, animals and adaptations.

There is also a place for an illustration of each habitat!

This resource also includes Venn diagrams comparing habitats and features, cut and sort papers to compare two habitats and writing papers.

sorting papers for various habitats and vocabulary words

Ambience

I have 2 photo backdrops for this unit; a desert and a rainforest one. The desert is very skinny, so I only kept it up for a few days as it let a lot of light in the room.

Click here to find links for all the photo backdrops I use for our knowledge units throughout the year.

*Please note: All links are Amazon Affiliate links. Thank you for your support!

To help give my students a better understanding of what each habitat looks like, I use videos and drone flyovers. Click here for a free copy!

Click here for a free download of animal cams for each habitat.

A fun website for exploring the depth of the ocean

Neal.Fun has an interactive page called The Deep Sea that my students always love to explore! It is a fun way to learn about the different zones of the ocean and what kinds of species live at each point. We use this on our pausing days after learning about the saltwater habitat.

Artwork

We always oil pastels, paint sticks and cardstock for these pieces. My students look forward to it each month!

Books

Most teachers already have a wide variety of animal books, but here are a few of my favorite habitat ones:

Arctic Animals book for Animals and Habitats

Arctic and Antarctic

Amazon Rainforest book for your Animals and Habitats Unit

The Amazon

Ocean

Habitats of the World

The Fascinating Animal Book for Kids

Celebration Activities

Arctic Adaptations

To help them understand the importance of blubber, we used the blubber bag.

The first year my bag leaked, so this year I made an updated version.

I used two sandwich bags filled with the bar Crisco. I have tried the jar, but it is messier when scooping. The bar lets you cut slices that easily drop in the bag.

I sealed the top of each bag with duct tape, then connected both bags by duct taping 3 sides together.

Then I placed them into a 3rd bag. This one worked perfectly - no leaks and I was even able to save it for next year!

ice bucket for our Arctic adaptation experiment

My students loved putting one hand in the ice water with no bag, while at the same time putting their other bagged hand into the water.

They were really able to feel how much the blubber helps in those chilly conditions!

Freshwater Adaptations

This activity helps students to understand how ducks stay dry in the water.

You just need paper bags, vegetable oil, droppers and water for this activity! This year I put wax paper on the trays to make cleaning up in between even easier.

The only prep required is cutting the bags into feather shapes.

I always do this activity in pairs. First they drop water onto a dry feather and discuss what they notice with their partner. Then they coat the 2nd feather with oil, and apply the water again.

They are always amazed at how the water just beads up, and then slides off when they lift it. It always leads to some great conversations about repelling water and how it benefits a duck if they need to fly off in a hurry from a predator.

Habitat Posters

Create a poster of your favorite animal habitat

Click here to download a free copy of this animal habitat poster. My students love to illustrate and write about their favorite habitat from this unit.

Animal Tracers and Coloring Pages

We used How to Draw animal tracing pages from easydrawingguides.com as well as Nat Geo's animal coloring pages.