What preschool activities can I do to teach the concept of habitat?

Question

I'm having the zoo come next week and they're bringing some animals for the kids to see. The zoo said I needed to talk about habitat, air water, shelter, herbivore, carnivore, etc. before they come on Thursday. They typically do Kindergarten, but the program will be for my 3-5's. Do you know of any activities that would incorporate those terms to help them learn the concepts

Answer 1

Use posterboard, yarn, etc. to make a "Jungle" corner in the room...sandbox,bright light etc. in the "Desert" corner...tall boxes, spray bottles, etc. to create the "rain forest" corner and maybe an igloo and ice cubes to create the "polar" corner.  Have all the children "become an animal" found in a picture book- and then they race from the middle of the room to see which area they can fill the fastest. (for ex.); if there is a polar bear, penguin, and seal / camel, lizard, and snake child..at the word "go" they each go to where they think they would need to live. Then you can lead this to talk about why they eat what they eat and the temp. etc.

Answer 2

You will find some fun activities here : http://teachers.net/projects/earthday/to...

Answer 3

you can do an activity like making a group of herbivores    and a group of carnivores and then give them each their own habitat and maybe change them each day so they can experience each one.

Answer 4

How about showing different animals in a list on one side of a poster board while you have their different habitats listed on the other side of the board. They can match each animal to its habitat. Such as birds in a tree nest, camel in the desert, and so on.

Answer 5

Find some children's books that talk about where different animals live. After you read the book have the children talk about where they live, and where animals live. Introduce the word habitat and shelter as you discuss.

Find some childrens' books that talk about what animals eat. After you read the book talk about what people eat and what animals eat. Introduce herbivore and carnivore (have them practice saying those words too).

Here's a site that lists all kinds of children's books under a theme... hopefully you can find something to help you out!

http://www.columbuslibrary.org/cmlpcbk/b...