Buckley, Carol. Tarra & Bella: the elephant and dog who became best friends. New York: G.P. Putnam's Sons, 2009. This is a true story about a dog and an elephant that become friends and communicate together.
Butterworth, Christine, and John Lawrence. Sea horse: the shyest fish in the sea. Cambridge, MA: Candlewick Press, 2006. This story has excellent photographs and captions about the seahorse.
Carle, Eric. Mister Seahorse. New York: Philomel Books, 2004. A creative story about father fish and their roles in childbirth.
Corse, Nicole. Seahorses. New York: Scholastic, 2011. An easy read about the seahorse and life under the sea.
D'Amico, Carmela, and Steven D'Amico. Ella, the elegant elephant. New York, NY: Scholastic, 2006. A great fictional story about an elephant that gets ready for the first day of school.
Green, Jen. Wolves. Danbury, Conn.: Grolier :, 2008. An informational text about wolves and their interactions with each other and the earth.
Hora?cek, Petr. My elephant. Somerville, Mass.: Candlewick Press, 2009. This fictional text lends to the imagination as a young boy brings an elephant through his house making a mess in every room until a grandparent finds the time to play with the young boy.
Jacquet, Luc, Jordan Roberts, Je?rome Maison, and Donnali Fifield. March of the penguins. Washington, D.C.: National Geographic, 2006. A slideshow of photographs taken of penguins while marching in the arctic.
Kasza, Keiko. When the elephant walks. New York: Putnam, 1990. Print. A story about a chain reaction of startling that starts when an elephant walks.
Lester, Helen, and Lynn Munsinger. Tacky the penguin. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Co., 1988. Print. A comical story about a penguin that does not fit in with the elegant penguins, who saves the day and becomes a hero in the community.
O'Connell, Caitlin, Donna M. Jackson, and T. C. Rodwell. The elephant scientist. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Books for Children ;, 2011. A non-fiction text about where elephants live and how they survive .
Schaefer, Lola M.. What is a mammal?. Mankato, Minn.: Pebble Books, 2001. This is a non-fiction text about the mammal lists the characteristics of a mammal and the text is on a level C for beginning readers to read independently.
"Seahorses, Seahorse Pictures, Seahorse Facts - National Geographic." National Geographic - Inspiring People to Care About the Planet Since 1888. http://Nationalgeographic.com/animals/fish/sea-horse (accessed May 26, 2013). Photographs of different seahorses that you can describe and compare with the students throughout the unit.
Stefoff, Rebecca. Sea horse. New York: Benchmark Books, 1997. This story will give a detailed description of the seahorse and the characteristics of the seahorse as well as the life cycle of a seahorse.
Willems, Mo.. I will Surprise my Friend!. New York: Hyperion Books for Children, 2008. This fictional story is about an elephant and piglet that play a human-like game of hide and seek.
Willems, Mo.. Elephants Cannot Dance!. New York: Hyperion Books for Children, 2009. This is a fictional story about an elephant learning to dance from his best friend a pig. The moral of the story is to try your best and great things will come.
Materials
In order to teach this unit, you will need the stories listed above in the student reading list. It would be helpful to have a laminated KWL chart that your students could help you fill in for each animal that you decide to present in your unit. The KWL chart would allow you to chart ideas and findings in order to refer back to them when comparing the animals to humans or other animals. A laminated Venn Diagram could be used when comparing the animal families to human families. It would also be helpful to have a laminated story web that you could use for the various animals we will explore in the unit. The film the March of the Penguins can be viewed on Netflix or rented from the local library.
For the parent craft days, prepare the crafts with construction paper, markers, glue and various decorations for the craft.
