Pets!

It's Dr. Seuss week this week and I have a great freebie in Spanish and English on TeachersPayTeachers! I'm hoping it will inspire parents to read with their kids; I'll let you know next week. We got off schedule this week due to snow and an ice storm that knocked out power in my town and the ones surrounding it, so hopefully next week I'll have some great items to share as we make books and rhymes. I'll also share some actual pictures of the Pets.

The last two weeks have been dedicated to Pets. A lot of the children were talking about what they have at home and one just got a new puppy. Perfect!

We made a chart we made of animals that we thought would make good pets and bad pets. I drew a line down the middle. On one side, I wrote "Good" and drew a smiley face; the other was marked "bad" and had a picture of a frowny face. "Snakes" shows up twice, in both columns.  Debate is an amazing tool to jumpstart thought.

Some of these animals showed up as 'good" pets, like the zebra. Jellyfish was a bad pet because of the stingers.
Pic from clker.com

After we talked about it, the kids drew in their weekly writing journal a picture of an animal. They told us whether it would be good or bad and why. Some of my favorite responses:
"A shark would be a good pet because you can pet its scaly skin."
"A spider would not be a good pet because it bites."
"A lion would make a good pet because it's nice." (I would love to know what nice lions he's seen!)
One child recreated the chart with happy and sad faces, then drew an animal under each.


What are some ways that you inspire critical thinking in your classroom? Post in the comments below!