This post is part of my 15 minute focus series, which work for kids approximately 4 – 6 years old. We do it in prepration for a field trip to an animal sanctuary for farm animals

Objectives:

• describe basic characteristics of birds vs. mammals.
• describe relative sizes of people and farm animals

Supplies

• “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
• one set of animal photos, cut apart and one set of animal illustrations, cut apart (see below). If you are working with 4 year olds, use the set of 8 animals. For older children, you could use the 13 animal set.

Note: The illustrations are sized 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 1.5 feet tall, so the illustration of a rooster is 3″ tall.)

Activity

Hold up the picture of an animal and ask them: what is this? what sound does it make? How big is it – is it taller than you or shorter than you? I would hold up the relative size illustrations of a human to show them how each animal compares to a human. (As tall as a sitting child, or as tall as a standing grown-up?)

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.

Extensions

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 (match the cow photo with the cow illustration, and so on)
• Use them at group time as you sing songs or use rhymes about farm 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? [Everyone moos. Then repeate with other animals.]

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 adult son is 32 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. 3 year olds are confused by this story – older kids love it!

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.