Wintering Animals
An Integrated Unit
The Montessori Philosophy
Blaise Nia Laing
ECH 537 University of Phoenix
Montessori Curriculum
 Montessori philosophy
 Montessori philosophy is respect every individual child, and
provide the child a well developed learning environment to
encourage intellectual, physical, and social development in a
none competitive environment where every child will have the
choice to choose which activity he is willing to work on.
Goals of Montessori Curriculum

To increase self-esteem and self discipline in a positive learning environment

To develop a live long love for learning

To build a solid foundation for academic success

Develop a positive attitude toward school
 Learning activities are individualized

Helping each child develop self-confidence
 Learning is based upon a step-by-step process only continuing when a child has mastered a step

Assisting each child in building a habit of concentration
 Teachers pay careful attention to what is said and demonstrated to the child (developmentally/curricular
appropriate)

Fostering an abiding curiosity
 Providing opportunities that are stimulating to the child in learning environments/situations

Developing habits of initiative and persistence
 Child becomes accustomed to individualized learned where he or she will be learning on their own with
materials they are familiar with

Fostering inner security and sense of order in the child
 Child feels secure and in control in the learning environment
Overview of Unit
 The rationale of the unit is to provide children with fun and
exciting lessons on winter animals. Children will have a basic
understanding of activities, habits, and concepts regarding
winter animals.
Grade Level and Development Age
 Pre-Kindergarten
 Age 3 to 5 years old
Brainstorming Web
Winter
Animals
Physical
Activities
Mathamatical
Activities
Science
Activities
Language
Activities
List of Activities
 Science: Exploring hibernation by creating a model of a cave for
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a bear to hibernate in.
Mathematics: Counting using sticks to make a house 1-10
through play.
Language: Phonics (Letter “B”)
Physical: Children pretending to be squirrels preparing for a
long winter. At Small group time children can use plastic salad
tongs to pick up the acorns and move them to their cups "nests."
Social: Using large boxes, sheets, or blankets to create places for
children to hibernate. This a great time for parents to read stories
with the "sleeping bears."
Concepts, Skills and Methods
 Spatial concepts created for bears caves.
 Counting 1-10 counting sticks
 Language concepts and letter recognition “letter b”
 Seasonal concepts and time being taught with preparation for
winter, gathering acorns.
 Parent involvement, social interactions, language, and
communication skills developing.
Assumptions regarding previous knowledge
 Knowledge of story structure
 Knowledge of the terms before and after
Summary of Activities
 1. Exploring Hibernation by creating a model of a cave for a




bear to hibernate in.
2. Counting using sticks to make a house 1-10 through play.
3.Phonics (Letter “B”)
4. Children are squirrels preparing for a long winter. At
Small group time children can use the plastic salad tongs to
pick up the acorns and move them to their cups "nests."
5. Using large boxes, sheets, or blankets to create places for
children to hibernate. This a great time for parents to read
stories with the "sleeping bears."
Activity 1: Science
 Science Activity: Hibernating Animals
 Materials Needed:
 Empty tissue box
 Small stuffed bear or squirrel
 Brown construction paper, gray construction paper,
glue, shredded paper
 Painted cotton balls torn apart to look like fur
 Steps to Science Activity:
 1. Have students turn tissue box upside down so that the
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rounded opening is facing them.
2. Have students tear small pieces of gray and brown
construction paper
3. Students glue the construction paper to the entire box, do
not cove the opening.
4. Students place shredded paper and painted and shredded
cotton into the inside of the box.
5. Place a small stuffed animal inside the box. The animal is
hibernating until spring.
 Prior Knowledge/Vocabulary Expected of students before
starting Science lesson:
 Hibernation
 Nests
 Objectives and Goals of the Science Lesson:
 The students will be able to replicate a scale model of a cave
with a hibernating animal inside.
 The students will be able to explain why the animal hibernates
in the winter and why the animal chooses the cave.
 The children will be able to give a brief description of what the
animal does during hibernation.
 Assessment of Science Lesson:
 The children will have successfully made a scale model of a
cave.
 The students will be able to explain why the animal is
hibernating in the cave.
 The students will be able to answer the question “How long will
the animal sleep in the cave or hibernate?”
Activity 2: Mathematics
 Mathematics Activity: How Many Sticks?
 Concepts, Skills, and Processes: counting, awareness of quantities
 Lesson Objectives
 Children will be able to count 123...10 consecutively.
 Children will understand quantitative relationships between
numbers.
 Children will build the number sequence 1 - 10 correctly.
 Developmental and/or content areas that have been integrated:
Mathematics and cognitive development.
Lesson Procedures
 Discuss with the children that today they are going to be
figuring out how to create a house for an animal by using
sticks. Brainstorm with the children what types of sticks
would they need.
 Ask the following questions:
 Are the sticks large or small?
 How many do you think would be needed to make a house for a
winter animal?
 Where would we find sticks to make a house if we were
animals?
 Have the children get ready to go outside and collect
sticks. Take the children on a nature walk and look for
sticks that are comparable to the size that they decided
would work best to build houses with.
 When back inside and in the learning area suggest to the
children that there should be a way to document how
many sticks we would need for different parts of the
house.
 How many walls are there?
 Will there be a door?
 Use the sticks to count out how many would be used for each
wall. Having the children line the sticks up and then ask
them to choose the number from the title box that best
represents the number of sticks chosen to use for the wall.
Do this for all of the walls.
 Having the children lay out their sticks for each wall onto the
floor with the number title above them. Lay each amount of
sticks next to each other so that from left to right the
children can count their sticks by adding the numbers of
sticks together.
6
7
6
8
+
 Have the children select the titles that represent the sign (+)
for addition and place them in between the number tiles.
Have the children write down on paper their number of
sticks for each wall. Then have the children add up all the
sticks by counting them all together and then documenting
the number of sticks that are needed to make the house.
 Supply the children with glue to put together the sticks to
make the walls. When the house is finished have the children
write the number of sticks used for each side of the house on
a small white square of paper and then tape it to each
coordinating wall.
Materials Needed
 Sticks collected by children
 Montessori Math Wooden Number Tiles with rods (Rods are
not used, children have collected sticks)
 Small white squares of paper
 White drawing paper for Brainstorming/Documenting
mathematical knowledge
 Tape
 Glue
Evaluation
 Children will be evaluated through their oral counting and
documentation of their work through writing out numbers
and through counting aloud. Teacher will observe this and
document their counting and number recognition when
children select number symbol to represent the number of
sticks for each wall.
Activity 3: Language Arts
 Language Arts Activity: Phoenix (letter B)
 Concepts, Skills, and Processes: awareness of sounds and alphabets
 Lesson Objectives
 Identify letter (B)
 Realize the sound that (letter B) make.
 Learn words that start with letter (B)
 Know how to write (letter B)
 Developmental and/or content areas that have been integrated:
Cognitive and language development.
Lesson Procedures:
 At circle time the teacher introduces letter “B” and the sound
the letter “B” makes.
 The teacher reads a story about letter “B” to the children.
Bubble Bear is a story that introduces letter B and words that
start with letter “B”.
 The teacher will have a conversation about what the story
was about.
 The children will move to small group time where every
child will work on tracing letter “B”.
Evaluation
 Presents a flash card with the picture of a bear to see if
children identify which letter Bear start with.
 Ask the children to point to (letter B) that is listed among
other alphabets at the board.
Activity 4: Physical
 Physical Activity: Children pretending to be squirrels
preparing for a long winter. At Small group time children can
use plastic salad tongs to pick up the acorns and move them
to their cups "nests.“
 Concepts, Skills, and Processes: Development of Fine motor skills
 Lesson Objectives:
 Learn about changes in seasons.
 Learn what animals do to prepare for change of seasons.
 Learn about squirrels habitats.
 Learn what squirrels like to eat.
Activity 4: Physical (Continued)
 Developmental and/or content areas that have been integrated:
Seasonal concepts and time concepts being taught with
preparation for winter, gathering acorns.
Activity 4: Physical (Continued)
 Lesson Procedures:Circle time discussion: Show pictures of
trees in each season of the year. Ask children to identify the
season and choose words to describe each: bare, blossoming,
budding, colorful, green, etc. Ask children what else is going
on in nature during each of these seasons when the tree
changes (colder or warmer temperatures, snow, etc.). Ask
children if they know what makes the tree change. Explain
that trees change because the temperature changes and the
length of the days grow or are getting shorter.
Activity 4: Physical (Continued)
 Teacher reads book Nuts toYou! By Lois Ehlert.
 Teachers can teach children a rhyme about squirrels.
Gray Squirrel, Gray Squirrel
Gray squirrel, gray squirrel
Shake your bushy tail. (Pretend to shake tail.)
Gray squirrel, gray squirrel
Shake your bushy tail, (Pretend to shake tail.)
Wrinkle up your funny nose, (Wrinkle nose.)
And put a nut between your toes. (Pretend to eat a nut.)
Gray squirrel, gray squirrel
Shake your bushy tail. (Pretend to shake tail.)
Activity 4: Physical (Continued)
 Children will move to small group. Every child will have
salad tongs, acorns, and a plastic cup to be able to move
acorns from the table into the cup using plastic salad tongs.
 Teacher can continue to discuss concepts learned from circle
time about squirrels preparing for winter.
Activity 5: Social
 Social Activity: Using large boxes, sheets, or blankets to
create places for children to hibernate. This a great time for
parents to read stories with the "sleeping bears."
 Concepts, Skills, and Processes: Parent involvement, social
interactions, language, and communication skills developing.
 Lesson Objectives
 Children will have an understanding of why bears hibernate.
 Children will interact communicate and interact socially.
 Developmental and/or content areas that have been integrated:
Parent involvement, social interactions, language, and
communication skills developing.
Activity 5: Social (Continued)
 Lesson Procedures: Follow up from science lesson on
hibernating bears.
 Pajama day hibernation party. Allow children to wear their
pajamas to school.
 Parent involvement to set up bear caves in the classroom
using large boxes, sheets, or blankets.
 Parents can help read with the bears in the caves.
Resource Websites
 http://www.atozkidsstuff.com/hibernation.html
This website provides educational activities for the hibernation
unit to include songs, books, rhymes, activities, etc.
www.brainpopjr.com/science/
 This website has online activities for children to participate in. It
also has animated movies where an animal is shown hibernating
and the author explains how the animal survives the winter
without eating.
Resource Websites (Continued)
 www.everythingpreschool.com/themes/hibernation
This website has ideas that include the children having a
“hibernation party” where they bring their sleeping bags and
pretend to be bears.
 www.kidssoup.com/Fall/Fall_Activties.html#freesquirrelactivities
This website is an online resource library for prekindergarten and
kindergarten activities. These are ideas shared by teachers for
teachers for ideas to teach children about squirrels.
Resource Websites (Continued)
 www.perpetualpreschool.com/preschool_themes/hibernation
This website has many ideas for preschool aged children about
hibernation that are designed and written by preschool teachers.
E-mail addresses are included so that the author can be contacted
for further information.
 www.suite101.com/content/preschool-winter-science
This website contains ideas for science centers about hibernation.
For example, making bear caves, putting up pictures of bears
putting out “bear food”, have the kids draw pictures of bears I
cave sleeping.
Resource Websites
 http://www.readinga-z.com/samples/index.html
This website provides activities for developing the literacy level of children at
different levels. The teacher can choose a reading materials based on her
objectives. She can choose the level of the story based on the children age and
based on her theme. For example, the teacher can choose a book that teaches
phonics, vocabulary, or poetry. This website can guide the teacher by choosing
the age appropriate reading materials. Also, the parents at home can use this
website with their children if they want to develop their children’s phonics
abilities or increased their vocabulary. This website provides lessons ideas of
phonics. Phonics is an important element that children need to master as a basis
for their reading level. Children will find the lessons ideas so fun and
interesting, and they will have the ability to master all the phonological sounds
of the alphabets. This website gives the teacher the chance to have an idea of
preparing her own phonics lesson plans or can order them online.
Resource Websites
 http://www.iknowthat.com/com/L2?GradeLevel=-
1:6&Subject=Language+Arts
This website is useful to use from the preschool level up to the sixth grade.
This website teaches children basic literacy skills through playing games. This
website provides great chances of cognitive development specially when the
children need to know the missing sound to complete a word. When
children answer the right answer this will increase their self-esteem and at
the same time if they got the wrong answer they will have another chance to
try to think what the right answer is. It will encourage children to think and
will make them believe that if we got the wrong answer we can go back,
think, and find the right answer. The children can create two teams to see
who will get the most accurate answer and will give them the chance to
experience the feeling of being a winner or a loser specially if their a teacher
monitoring, and encouraging the loosing team to try their best next time.
Resource Websites
 http://www.starfall.com/
Starfall is a quality website that teaches children phonics and how to read.
The children have the chance to choose the alphabet, hear the sound of the
alphabet, and present some words that start with the chosen letter. The
website provides many chances for the child to hear the sound several times
before moving back or forward to a different letter. The repetition process
can teach the children the sounds of the alphabets in a very easy and fun
manner. The website also teaches them phonics by creating games for
children to be able to distinguish upper and lower cases. Children need to
use the mouse many times and this will help them develop their fine motor
skills. Children can play the phonetic games together and this will develop
their social skills through chatting with each other, emotional skills through
learning to take turns, and cognitive skills through being able to choose the
right answer.