Shauna January 21, 2012

One of our preschool themes this month has been “Penguins”. Boy have we been having fun learning all about penguins as well as making some really fun penguin art projects. I have a lot of fun freebies for you today. I will be posting part 2 and part 3 of our penguin theme soon.

Here are a few of the activities we did our first day of our penguin theme:

First Little Red and her friend (who joins us for preschool) worked on this “Parts of a Penguin Paper” for their opening activity. I discussed with the girls what each word said and then I had them guess where to place the label on their paper.

Here is Little Red’s paper. As I was getting ready to take the picture she said, “Wait Mom!” She then proceeded to place the materials she used around her paper (the glue got cut off). I thought that it was so cute and she is definitely observant of the many times I have “set up” pictures for this blog. This great “Parts of a Penguin Paper” comes from the amazing blog Kindergarten Crayons, and you can CLICK HERE to be taken to the post where you can download this paper for free.

For part of our Circle Time activities we sang this cute song above “I’m a Little Penguin” and I made up different actions for each line of the song. I then read them the book, National Geographic Kids Penguins! book (see below), and we talked all about penguins. This book is excellent and I highly recommend it. The photographs are lovely and the text is simple and interesting for children to listen to.
After we discussed the book I asked them what they learned about penguins and I recorded their responses above. When you are doing an activity like this it is important to make your child feel like every fact they share is so wonderful, even if they say things like “Some have polka dots on their stomachs”.

After giggling, and waddling around like a penguin for a while we got to work on this adorable art project. I found the idea of making a penguin and using your child’s handprints for their feet off of the awesome blog, Casa Camacho. Casa Camacho has many wonderful ideas and tips for your home and family. CLICK HERE to go to the original post for this craft idea.

Here are the girls finished Penguin Handprint art projects. Aren’t they the most darling things ever?!? Of course my daughter “Little Red” said, “Mom, can I make my penguin more fancy?” Of course I said, “Yes!”, and both Little Red and her friend found pretty jewels to adhere to their penguins. I love having simple patterns where kids can trace and cut out their own art projects, so I made a pattern for the penguins we made that you can download below.

Here are a few of the books we read together. Sources for these books are included in the free download below.

The girls favorite book was our Usborne Book “Hide and Seek Penguins“. Each page has fun lift the flaps as well as fun textures you can touch and feel. Not to mention the story is cute and the illustrations are darling. When I went on my sister’s Usborne book website, I don’t think this book is in print right now. But I found a lot of other amazing penguin themed books that you could use. With Usborne Books, you just can’t go wrong.
Another fun activity I wanted to share with you that we did this day was my “Mr. Penguin Page” that comes from my “My Winter Activity Book” that you can find in my Learn and Grow Designs Shop. The paper says, “Mr. Penguin is lonely and he needs some friends. Can you draw some friends to make Mr. Penguin Happy?” Isn’t my youngest daughter’s drawing of a penguin adorable on the left? She is only 5 years old. I think her penguin’s face is so sweet!
Here is what the rest of the “My Winter Activity Book” looks like:

 Now for the part I know you are going to be so excited about.

All of the “I’m a Little Penguin Unit” activities shown in the above picture are free for you to download today. The only thing I ask is that you abide by the terms of use included in the download and that you direct people to this blog post, not just the download link to get their own free copy. Sound good? Well then CLICK HERE to start some penguin fun. Of course I always love comments, hint, hint :0) More penguin fun and freebies to come!

0 thoughts on “Penguin Books, Crafts, Songs, and Activities part 1”

  1. Super cute stuff. My kids loved the book "Tacky the Penguin." Tacky is a very unusual penguin! They are fun books, especially if you sing along.

  2. Cindy, we actually read Tackylocks and my girls loved it. Thanks for your kind comment and suggestion and for stopping by.

  4. Those handprint penguins are so cute! I plan on downloading your Penguin Unit and I'm going to direct people here through my Facebook Page.

  5. Cute Stuff. I love Hide and Seek Penguins, too. (I still like Hide and Seek Dragons the best, though.) Can't wait to download your cute stuff. Wouldn't little mister's hands look so cute as penguin feet? I might have to do it just for kicks. Thanks again!

  7. Thank you so much for this post and the free penguin mini unit. I'm looking forward to doing a "penguin week" with my 2 and 5 year olds next week.