Frogs: Facts & Fiction!

Ask any of my second graders and they'll tell you that I love frogs!  We just concluded a unit comparing fiction with non-fiction, and the culminating activity was centered on my favorite amphibian.  The students started off researching facts in the many, many books I have on the subject.  They learned a lot as they practiced how to take notes and cite sources!  Here are a few of their fascinating frog facts:

Jaxon learned that one kind of frog eats mice!
(source: Frogs by Nic Bishop)

Tyler learned that the goliath frog can jump father than any other frog!
(source: The Frog Alphabet Book by Jerry Pallotta)

Casimir learned that some frogs use their eyeballs to swallow.  The food is pushed down their throat by blinking!
(source: Frogs! by Kathryn Satterfield)

Joey learned that a frog can eat more than 5,000 insects in one summer.
(source: Nic Bishop's Frogs by NicBishop)



Taylor learned that leaches are predators of frog eggs!
(source: A Frog's Life by Ellen Lawrence)

Ramsey learned that the African clawed frog has no tongue!
(source: Frogs by Barbara Taylor)

Next, the students were challenged to exercise their creativity by imagining a frog that couldn't possibly exist.  By designing their "fiction frogs" I hope to give them a concrete, personal image they can refer back to when trying to remember that fiction means "not real".  (The terms fiction and nonfiction are frequently mixed up!)  As you can see, their illustrations provided some hilarious results!

 "FICTION FROGS"

You'll never see a frog...

Click on image to enlarge!

 

 

Click on image to enlarge!

Fiction Insects

Miss Hurley here again, and today I’d like to share with you a project that the second graders have been working on.  In library class, the students have been studying the differences between fiction and nonfiction books.  To practice this, the students created fiction insects!  Earlier this year they did research projects on insects with their classroom teachers that involved nonfiction information.  So in library, they were given the prompt:  “You’ll never see a…” and they had to finish the sentence by describing something that their insect would never do, making it fiction.  Once they had created their sentence they had to illustrate it.

This project was designed to help them remember that fiction is not real, as illustrated by the silly things that their fiction insects are doing.  After vacation, the final copies will be hanging up above the fiction section of the library to remind them where they can find fiction books. 

But there’s more!  Not only are the insects on display in the library, but we also created a Photo Story video for each class!  Each student got to record his/her own sentence for the video and the whole class worked together for the final slide.  This week the project was finally complete and both classes got to watch their videos.  The kids came up with super creative insects and it was so much fun watching the process.  If you would like to see these awesome insects you can watch the videos here:

Mrs. Gray's Class

Mrs. Pearce's Class

Oh my gosh!  I can’t believe how fast these six weeks have flown by!  Sadly, this is my last blog post as my time here at Ashaway has come to an end.  I have had such a wonderful experience at this school and I am sure going to miss all of my new friends!