In January we were in the midst of a winter animals investigation, yet it was becoming clear how much my kiddos REALLY wanted to learn more in depth about an animal rather than about the broader subject of animal adaptations. Kindergarten investigations are always more meaningful when they're hands on, so I decided it made the most sense to wrap up our winter animals investigation early and dive deep into learning about our very own Strudel. Thus, our guinea pig investigation was born...
We began where we so often do, by filling our room with books about our new topic. The kids were SO excited about our books that they literally couldn't stay in their seats while looking at them!
If we were going to learn about guinea pigs we would of course need to be able to draw them. A You Tube tutorial was the perfect art "teacher" for us.
Now we were ready to begin! Rather than starting off by asking the kids what they wondered about our new topic (as I often do with investigations), instead I posed a broad guiding question that would serve as the framework for our learning - "What do we need to learn in order to become guinea pig experts? After much conversation and consolidating, we narrowed our focus down to 8 categories ("communication" got added to our web the next day) that we would need to explore in order to become true experts.
The kiddos are pretty well versed at the point in the school year about ways to find out more information about a topic, and it was exciting to realize this investigation would lend itself to ALL FOUR research categories (books, internet, look and think, and ask an expert)!
We began by using books and videos to research types of guinea pigs, and then we worked together to make an anchor chart of our learning.
Then we moved on to finding out what guinea pigs do and don't eat. We worked in pairs and as a whole class using books and videos to gather and record our information,
but in order to find out exactly which foods Strudel likes the most we had to devise a taste test and find ways to keep track of the information we collected. Now the kindergarteners know exactly which of their foods they can and can't share with Strudel during snack, and the kiddos get especially excited when they happen to have one of Strudel's favorites in their lunchbox. He's a lucky (and full) little guinea pig most days!
This group of kiddos LOVES imaginative stories, and the circle stories we wrote during our hot air balloon investigation continue to be some of their favorite books in our classroom library. So, we worked together to craft a creative story titled Strudel's Nighttime Adventure. Each child wrote and illustrated a page of the book, we added a copy to our classroom library, and each kindergartener got to take a copy of the story home. It was fun hearing from parents how much the kiddos treasure their Strudel story.
Of course they just HAD to read our story to Strudel too!
Next we researched what guinea pigs like to do for fun,
and during fab lab each kiddo designed and built a "toy" for Strudel to enjoy.
The best part was watching Strudel have fun with (and in) his new toys and play spaces!
What do you do when it's a 70 degree day in February and your guinea pig loves to eat grass? Well, take him outside to enjoy the beautiful weather of course!
Next we were ready to begin learning about how guinea pigs communicate. A book helped us learn about some of the different squeaks, and videos helped us figure out exactly what each squeak sounds like. Once we learned to distinguish the different sounds, we began to notice Strudel's various noises more and more often. It's especially exciting when we can tell what he's thinking from his sound.
It was time to interview our first expert. Many of the kiddos knew Ms. Robin's guinea pig from their days in preschool or JK, so they were thrilled to go back and visit Julie pig. Ms. Robin graciously answered all of our questions and helped us learn so much about Julie pig. Strudel and Julie Pig had such a fun playdate, and the kiddos were overjoyed to hear lots of "love squeaks" from Strudel :)
Right after our visit we worked with partners to note similarities and differences between the guinea pigs, and then we gathered all our thoughts onto a master Venn diagram. I was completely impressed by how observant the kindergarteners are becoming!!
As we learned more about a guinea pig's body parts, we kept track of them on a diagram. We learned that guinea pigs use their whiskers for feeling, have a great sense of smell, can't see at night, have a tailbone inside their body, have 258 fragile bones, and SO much more. Keeping track of our information this way enabled me to introduce the word diagram, and right away the kindergarteners began noticing diagrams in our classroom library...and even began creating some of their own during writing workshop.
Our second guinea pig expert (my daughter) was coming to visit next. Since Strudel officially belongs to her and she knows so much about taking care of him, we knew she would be the perfect expert to answer some of our questions about taking care of guinea pigs.
Sophie taught us all about brushing Strudel, clipping his nails, bathing him, and more, and then we recorded some of the most important information we learned to take home and teach to our families.
Integrating art and music into each investigation helps makes the learning experience so much richer and more meaningful for the kiddos. There isn't a lot of guinea pig music out there, but we did manage to find a rhyme/fingerplay that we all enjoyed.
Imaginative play is also such an important modality for helping young children make sense of what they're learning, so I added toy guinea pigs to our building area. They were a huge hit, and I loved watching (and listening) to different groups of kiddos use them in their creative play.
Similar to music, art, and creative/dramatic play, storytelling is another meaningful way for young children to learn about and internalize a topic. All I did was hand each child a poster board and assign them the task of telling a story about a guinea pig, and their seemingly endless creative juices started flowing. They made characters, drew settings full of action and suspense, practiced telling their stories in a way that made sense and would be interesting/exciting for the listener, and then got to share their stories with each other. Having an authentic audience in mind adds such an important (and meaningful) element to the storytelling process.
Throughout our investigation the topic of guinea pigs continually crept into the children's independent writing as well. There were Strudel counting books, imaginative stories about guinea pigs, and some guinea pig pattern books too. As a teacher you can be certain that you've found an engaging topic when it makes its way into the children's independent work and play!
Next up it was time to learn about guinea pig habitats. We began with the challenge of finding out what six things a guinea pig cage needs in order to be safe and cozy, and we watched a few videos to help us zero in on those six things. Then each kiddo used what we had learned to design the perfect guinea pig cage.
Since my class is so used to building 3 dimensionally, they were shocked (and slightly horrified!) to discover that I was only planning for them to design the cage (but not actually build it). What was I thinking?!! After much pleading a new fab lab activity was born...we created clay guinea pigs and then built the perfect homes for them.
By now we had learned everything we set out to discover in our quest to become guinea pig experts, yet there was still so much information in our non-fiction guinea pig books that the kids still wanted to talk and learn about. So, next we researched and shared our favorite fun facts with each other. The kindergarteners are becoming SO skilled at looking carefully at pictures, thinking deeply about what they see, and recording what they've learned on a sticky note using just a few words. It's amazing how much a kindergartener can learn on his/her own!
Believe it or not, while we were investigating guinea pigs we had ALSO been investigating mazes...and our third and final expert helped merge our love for guinea pigs with our interest in mazes. Bella Grace came to teach us all about the science experiment she had conducted earlier in the year,
and she inspired us to create a maze of our own for Strudel.
Strudel is pretty lazy, but luckily we could coax him through with one of his favorite treats...blueberries.
During the course of our investigation we found out that guinea pigs are in the rodent family, along with hamsters, mice, and rats. Since the kindergartners were so clearly NOT ready to be done investigating Strudel, I decided to use this information as a springboard into a new portion of our exploration. Thus began the guinea pig/hamster part of our study. Since many of our chapel buddies have a pet hamster in their classroom, we decided to head up to fourth grade on a mission to find out more about a different type of rodent. The kindergarteners wondered...
and the fourth graders graciously answered our questions. They helped us learn SO much about Olive, and we especially loved petting her and watching her roll around in her ball.
One of the kindergarteners wanted to bring his beloved hamster to school, so Coco finally got to come to kindergarten.
While Coco was visiting we watched a video about a little boy who created an impressive obstacle course for his hamster. Some of the kindergartners were inspired to create an obstacle course for Coco. Of course they didn't want Strudel to feel left out, so they made him an obstacle course too :)
During our investigation we read a chapter book about Fluffy the guinea pig and then one about Humphrey the hamster. Our chapter books, along with our experiences learning about guinea pigs and hamsters, our experience having a hamster visit our classroom for the day, and a Dr. Seuss book about the best pet got us wondering whether hamsters or guinea pigs make the best class pet...and why. We learned the word "opinion," and through multiple conversations about the topic we learned a lot about perspective too. Of course there is not one correct answer to this question, which made discussing and debating the topic all the more engaging and thought provoking for the kindergarteners. I just loved listening to their little wheels turn!
We had such a great time visiting Olive and the fourth graders, so we headed back to fourth grade to culminate to this portion (guinea pigs/hamsters) of our investigation. Each kindergartener worked with a fourth grade buddy to write an adventure starring both Strudel and Olive. The kindergartners loved having a scribe so that their creative ideas could come to fruition so quickly!
They were SO proud of their completed stories!
As we approached the end of our investigation I started thinking about how much the kiddos love Strudel and what a big part of their kindergarten experience he is. How could I best help capture their love for him? I had recently watched a powerful video about a boy who drew multiple drafts of a butterfly and got helpful feedback from his classmates after each draft. The video teaches such a profound and concrete lesson, so I decided to show it to the kindergarteners. They were immediately inspired to work just as hard as the boy in the video to make a picture of Strudel...which would ultimately become a portrait that they could keep forever. They examined photos of Strudel up close, drew him, reflected on their work, drew him again,
learned some new painting techniques, painted Strudel, painted their background,
and VOILA...their very own framed portraits of Strudel, to keep "forever."
We had officially reached the end of our investigation by becoming true guinea pig experts, so it was the perfect time to introduce the kiddos to informational writing in preparation for our upcoming non-fiction unit in writing workshop. We sat together in front of our collection of anchor charts, and each child shared a favorite thing(s) he/she had learned about guinea pigs. It was beyond impressive to hear how much they remembered, especially since we had just been out of school on spring break for a week.
We turned their favorite facts into a book all about guinea pigs, and we returned to Ms. Robin's preschool room so we could use our book to teach her preschoolers everything we had learned. We knew her students would be interested in guinea pigs because they have one in their classroom, but since they're so little they obviously can't research and learn nearly as much as we can. The kindergarteners we SO proud to have become such big kid experts, and getting to teach the preschoolers gave our learning so much purpose. We even let Ms. Robin keep the book so she can read it to her new students every year.
At the end of an investigation it's always so rewarding to look back and notice how many skills were so naturally woven into our learning journey along they way. As long as the topic is engaging for your particular group of students, the possibilities for learning to wonder, find answers, interview, research, record information, look closely, observe, read, write, graph, compare, design, build, draw, paint, sculpt, sing, play, debate, persevere, reflect, share, and teach others are seemingly endless. Now that's the real beauty of project learning!
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