At our preschool, we have an upcoming field trip to an animal sanctuary for farm animals. So our Science Friday theme was to learn about farm animals.

This post is part of my 15 minute focus series, which are activities designed to do with a small group of 4 year olds gathered around a table. It would also be appropriate as a homeschool science activity for kids age 3 to 6 or so.

Objectives:

• identify farm animals and the sounds they make,
• learn basic characteristics of birds vs. mammals.
• describe relative sizes of people and farm animals

Supplies: printed pictures – cut apart, “sheep wool” vs. “goat hair” (fake fur samples or other items that show similar textures), feathers, plastic farm animals as fidgets to hold on to for those who need them

I created two documents. One had photos of all the animals at the animal sanctuary. The other had illustrations of each one, and I adjusted the sizes of the illustrations to reflect the relative heights of the animals. (The illustrations are two inches tall for every foot tall an animal is. For example, a cow is about 4 feet tall, so the illustration of the cow is 8 inches tall. A rooster is about 18″ tall, so the illustration of a rooster is 3″ tall. I also had illusrations of humans to compare them to.)

I printed and cut out the pictures and illustrations. I would hold up the picture of an animal and ask them: what is this? what sound does it make? We would talk about how big it was – is it taller than you or shorter than you? I would hold up the relative size illustrations to show them. We talked about things like: how many legs does it have? does it have fur or feathers? does it lay eggs? This all introduces ideas about birds versus mammals. [All the details of what I covered are in the lesson plans below.] Whenever they started getting antsy, we’d sing a verse of Old McDonald about whatever animal we were talking about at that time.

After you do the formal lesson with these images, you can use them for plenty of other activities. You could:

• Put illustrations in order by size
• Sort into piles of “bigger than me” and “smaller than me”
• Sort pictures into birds and mammals.
• Find the matches (both cows, both goats, etc.)
• Use them at group time as you sing songs or use rhymes about farm animals.

I did all 13 animals that are at the sanctuary. I learned that was too many for a 4 year old attention span, so I recommend doing only 8 animals.

In the free printable files below, you’ll find lesson plans, the photos of the animals, and the illustrations showing relative sizes.

Songs to Sing / Rhymes

• Old McDonald
• Bingo
• To the tune of Wheels on the Bus: the cows on the farm go moo, moo, moo. Etc.
• rhyme: I went to the farm the other day. I met a cow along the way. And what do you think I heard it say?

Books to Read

Big Red Barn by Margaret Wise Brown. Sweet bedtime book about a day on the farm, that winds down to bedtime. There are lots of details in the illustrations to talk about. [Note: links are Amazon Affiliate links – if you purchase, I do receive a small bonus.]

Farmer Duck by Martin Waddell. A story about a duck who does all the work till the animals rebel against a lazy farmer. Great rhythm. Just a fun story! (Even though my son is 31 now, if I just ask “How goes the work?” he replies “QUACK!” just like Farmer Duck says!)

The Little Rabbit Who Liked to Say Moo by Allen. Animals try out other animal’s sounds.

The Little Red Hen. There are several book versions of this classic tale. Galdone‘s is nice. If you’re making bread, this is a nice tie-in to that activity.

Poke a Dot: Old MacDonald’s Farm. This is a counting book. Each page has plastic dots you can “pop”. I’m normally not a fan of “gimmicky” books, but I think this one is great for learning one-to-one correspondence, an essential math skill.

Find more Farm activities in my “Fun with Toddlers” series on my other blog.