Insect Investigations

It's about to get real buggy up in this classroom.

Insect Investigations are well underway in first and second grade!!

Meet Eddie! He's our resident Entomologist. Eddie is going to be sending out class letters all throughout this unit. Not just letters, but also photographs of the insects he is studying. With each letter the class will be practicing our inference skills too.

 Photographs that will be coming with the above letter. :)

As we study each Insect, we will be adding them to the jumbo jar. 

This is what it will look like when we're done.

With each bug that arrives we will be diving into some research of our own. The students will record all their findings in their Entomologist journals.

Ready to Research and record our data.

A few new books may be popping up in the mailbox too along the way.

Entomologists use some BIG words. So these will be on display during out unit.

And as always, we'll be practicing our close reading skills with passages and text based questions for each insect. There are black and white copies and colored copies included.

 Students use a hilighter to show their "evidence" before answering the questions.

Buggin' out over insect parts here!!

If you have to bug out too, Insects {Common Core Classroom} might be right up your alley!!

 Check it out in my TPT shop. You can download the preview for an even closer look.

Let me just end by saying, I don't think anyone despises these little six legged beasts more than me. I am very confident in that statement. Haha!! I mean, my husband could tell you stories for days about all the times I have more than just casually FREAKED OUT over a bug. Take for example the time we traveled to the rain forest in Costa Rica. We had to drive on windy dirt roads for no less than four six hours to get there. Then I found a roach and a spider BIGGER THAN MY HAND in our fancy shmancy hotel room. I cried. A lot. And I might have made us both stay up all night long with the lights on because I couldn't sleep knowing those not so tiny monsters were within a ten mile radius of me. Also, we left the next day. Six hours back down to the coast. But hey, we DID see this sloth and her baby on the trip back down. Which instantly became the highlight of my trip to the rainforest!!!

So it's not like I can't appreciate nature or anything. I just can't appreciate insects.

My family found it pretty  hilarious that I of all people would create an entire unit about them. But it's a part of our curriculum and I knew I needed to come up with something my kids AND I could love enough to distract their dear ol' teacher from the subject matter. 

And in spite of my feelings, I actually really really enjoyed making this unit!!!

Did I just say that? I did!! I'm not pulling your leg either. This was a fun unit to make!

Believe you me, somewhere in the world a pig is flying.