to the Heart of the Rainforest

The rainforest is one of our newest units in first grade. It's technically a science unit, but, as with most units in our classroom, it spills over into all content areas. We usually begin this study in March. At the end of our February unit on frogs, we read about poison dart frogs, tree frogs and other frogs of the rainforest - a perfect seque into the new unit! Our first project is making a bromeliad, complete with mama frog and baby tadpole. Using a bathroom size cup, the children use a tracer to make a pink blossom for inside the cup and wrap the green leaves around the outside. Because the children have learned that bromeliads act as pools for tadpoles to live in, they color the inside bottom of the cup blue and use model magic to make a frog/tadpole or both.

Then, like the frogs, we're ready to "leap" into learning about the rainforest. Some of the many books we'll read are:

Rain Forest Counts!
The Great Kapok Tree (Cherry)
The Shaman's Apprentice (Cherry)
Living in the Rainforest (Rookie Reader)
At Home in the Rainforest (Willow)
Eyewitness Rainforest
A Walk in the Rainforest
Who Grows up in the Rainforest
Rain Forest Birds (Kalman)
The Umbrella (Jan Brett)
Destination Rainforest (Grapper)
Who Lives in the Rainforest (Canizares)
Here is the Tropical Rainforest (Dunphy)
If I Ran the Rainforest
Nature's Green Umbrella (Gibbons)
Rainforest Animals (Hess)

THE HEART OF THE RAINFOREST
A Poem by Mrs. Tonnessen

The rain falls down with a beating sound
DEEP IN THE HEART OF THE RAINFOREST
Monkeys swing and birds will sing
DEEP IN THE HEART OF THE RAINFOREST
Pythons glide and treefrogs ride
DEEP IN THE HEART OF THE RAINFOREST
Parrots squawk and jaguars stalk
DEEP IN THE HEART OF THE RAINFOREST
Butterflies fly in the warm, wet sky
DEEP IN THE HEART OF THE RAINFOREST

On two large classroom bulletin boards, we actually "create" the rainforest in our room! We start with a bulletin board on which I place several very simple trees of varying sizes. We first read about the four layers of the rainforest - forest floor, understory, canopy and emergent layer. We complete a puzzle-like worksheet illustrating the layers and add to our rainforest the paper "twirly" liana vines, the ferns and the strangler figs. We also read about the water cycle of the rainforest and sing the song "The Rain is Coming." We may even create mini rainforests by planting in cups and placing plastic wrap over so that they children can see transpiration in action!

Then we begin a detailed study of each of the layers and the animals that live there. Each child begins a four-page, teacher made booklet called "Animals of the Rainforest" and on each page they write about one type of animal from each of the four layers. At this time we're also creating a huge class chart on animals of the rainforest, where we chart the habitats, diets and interesting facts about the animals we study. For the forest floor, we study tarantulas, gorillas and the large cats, including tigers, jaguars, leopards and oceleots. We read many nonfiction books to gather information on each animal.

In addition to factual animal books, we also read many fiction stories. After reading about real gorillas, we look at pictures that I've photocopied from the almost-wordless book "The Gorilla Did It." Then, before actually reading the story, the children write their own story based on the pictures. After they've shared their versions, we'll read aloud the original...some of their stories are even better!

We then move up to the understory layer where we concentrate on the many snakes of the rainforest. The children are fascinated by these, including the very poisonous Gaboon Viper! A great fictional story to read while learning about snakes is "The Day Jimmy's Boa Ate the Wash" and "The Greedy Python."

The children love to learn about the various monkeys of the canopy layer, including the spider, howler and capuchin monkeys. There are lots of adorable monkey fiction books - we like "100 Monkeys," "Caps for Sale" and others. For the emergent layer, we focus on the birds and butterflies, including the harpy eagle (life size in the picture!), parrot, toucan, macaw, Blue Morpho butterfly (also life size in the photo), Queen Alexandra birdwing (largest butterfly of all) and more.
Each time we study a layer, the children complete another page in their "Animals of the Rainforest" booklet.

Now that the children have TONS of information on rainforest animals, they are ready to write their first nonfiction animal report. During the unit I read the very simple Rainforest Animals books by Helen Frost. I have 5 xeroxed copies of each title (Jaguars, Gorillas, Tigers, Lemurs, Leaf Cutting Ants, Tarantulas, Tree Frogs, Parrots). They first choose an animal and take that booklet. We then complete a web-shaped prewriting planner and over the course of a few days we write a chapter about the animal and its description, its habitat, diet and other interesting facts. I send a note home letting the families know what animal their first grader has chosen in case they want to do extra "research" on the internet or library as a family! They put a lot of effort into this report and I share it with the parents at our spring conferences.

As we near the end of the unit, we read a bit about the native peoples of the rainforest, and we make rainsticks using the craft kit from S&S Crafts. Lakeshore also has a rainstick craft kit but it is more expensive! One of the highlights is the rainforest taste test. I send a note home to the families asking for a contribution of one of the following items (I assign it): mango, papaya, avocado, coconut, banana, chocolate, chewing gum, vanilla extract, black pepper, cinnamon, fig newtons, brazil nuts and macadamia nuts. The children have a teacher-made sheet with the names and pictures of the items we'll be tasting and they write whether or not they've tried the item before and whether or not they liked it once they've tried it! Many had never tasted fruits such as mango and papaya!

The children become very passionate about saving the rainforest and are excited to be able to help by contributing to one of the many preservation sites. One child emptied his entire piggy bank because he was so moved! Be sure to read "The Great Kapok Tree" for a beautiful story of the importance of saving the rainforests of the world. Here are two sites that we've contributed to recently.

Kids Saving the Rainforest Friends of Calukmul

To end our terrific unit, we travel to the rainforest...the Rainforest Cafe! We take a field trip to the restaurant which is about 40 minutes away. There we are met by a safari guide who gives us a 30 minute tour, describing the faux animals and the real fish. Then we sit down to a delicious meal! Visit their site below!

Rainforest Cafe

THE RAINFOREST CAFE
a poem by Mrs. Tonnessen

Have you been to the Rainforest Cafe?
We're going! We're going! We're on our way!
We'll see monkeys and frogs and birds and fish!
We'll eat all the food piled high on our dish!
We'll hear the rain and see the trees!
We'll want to go back there...
Can we PLEASE?

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