Leapin' Life Cycles!

Leapin' life cycles we had fun with these frogs! So far we've learned 

about the life cycles of butterflies, plants, and now frogs. My team 

and I decided we'd use life cycles as the theme for our 

end of year open house and we've been busy thinking of ways 

we can incorporate life cycles across our curriculum. 

We read lots of nonfiction books about frogs and my class wrote 

things they've learned about each stage of the frog's life cycle on

 these lily pad sticky notes.  I drew the shape

then copied it on construction paper.  We used repositionable

glue sticks to turn them into sticky notes. I used clip art

from Scrappin'Doodles for the pictures.

I've been working with my students on how to take notes and determining what 

information is considered important and note worthy.

We watched some video clips on Discovery Education as well as 

on Brain Pop Jr. and students took notes that they would 

later use to write about the frog's life cycle.

One of the things we've talked a lot about is that taking notes means 

writing down important vocabulary, main ideas, and facts rather than 

complete sentences.  This was so tricky for them at first and I'm

so proud of how far they've come!

As a culminating project, we made this

 Frog Life Cycle On A String craft which will be part

of our open house display.

There are two versions of this in the download.  An easy-cut 5-stage cycle

for younger students and a crafty-cut 7 stage cycle. I did a combo of both 

and did a 5-stage crafty-cut since my students are able to cut out 

more elaborate shapes.  Students used their notes to write about each stage 

 in the little lily pad booklets. 

We assembled all the pieces in order on the string glued on some

wiggly eyes (my kids LOVE wiggly eyes!) then added black dots

 to the beads eggs with a Sharpie! Fun, fun, fun!!

Everything tucks into the large lily pad pocket for display and students simply 

pull the string out slowly to reveal each stage!

Here's a little look at the 7-stage version.

If you're looking ideas for your life cycles unit and need some frog fun

click any of the pictures to find this in my TPT shop!