Shark Activities for Kindergarten
Sharks are animals that seems mysterious because of their existence undersea and their hunting prowess. These qualities make them intriguing for young students, so sharks can be an engaging topic of study for a kindergarten classroom. If you are lucky enough to have an aquarium or beach nearby, schedule a field trip for students to experience the habitat and sea life, even if they may not see any real sharks. Use the word "shark" to introduce and reinforce the sound "sh" with the emerging readers.
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Shark Crafts
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Making crafts is a way for students to use their hands to make visual representations demonstrating their understanding of a topic, so schedule a couple of shark crafts as activities. You can make shark jaws by rolling construction paper tubes, flattening them out and drawing teeth inside. Then fold the tube in half and draw eyes and a nose. Glued them onto paper shark bodies from templates. Or, create sharks out of paper lunch bags by coloring in the flap as the jaws. Glue fins on the sides and a dorsal fin on the back.
Anatomy of a Shark
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Sharks' bodies are unusual in the animal world, with their rows of constantly growing teeth, their cartilaginous skeletons and their gills. Draw a large shark on a piece of butcher paper; you can even measure it out to show students the actual size of a certain type of shark. Then talk about all the different body parts and add things to the shark to illustrate. For instance, talk about their rough skin and glue a bit of sandpaper to the shark. Talk about their flimsy bones and stretch a piece of silly putty along the backbone; glue on small strips of paper as little flaps to show the gills.
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Story Time
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Read stories and informational books with content aimed toward children to reinforce the lessons. For a fictional book addressing the topic of shark phobias, read The Shark Who Was Afraid of Everything by Brian James. If you would like a fact-based comprehensive look at sharks, try The Best Book of Sharks, by Claire Llewellyn. For students who are beginning to read on their own, give them a reader that is appropriate for their level, such as Hungry Hungry Sharks, by Joanna Cole.
Useful Resources
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For further information about sharks and as a resource for children to try activities online, visit Ocean of Know's website. If you would like shark worksheets, puzzles, coloring pages and other printable activities, visit Kids' Zone's shark activities website. The Enchanted Learning website offers a wealth of lesson ideas and crafts for a general ocean theme, including some about sharks.
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References
Resources
- Photo Credit shark image by Timothy Lubcke from Fotolia.com
