Animal Habitats

Why The short week

清明 falls on the Monday, so the week starts a day late and every day after it does a little more:

• Tuesday carries two objects and two words — the nest comes out of the box first, then the den. Two homes, side by side, is actually the better lesson: high and open versus low and dark.
• Five words on four days: nest → den together on Tuesday, then pond, web and live one a day.
• The song has four verses, not five — Tuesday's verse is the long one, with a couplet for the bird and a couplet for the fox. Nothing is missing; that is the whole song.
• Friday is not touched. The whole song top to bottom, the who lives here? review, the awards and the parent wrap-up all still land on Friday, exactly as they would in a five-day week.

Outdoors What to look at over the long weekend

清明 is the day families sweep the graves and then walk out into the green — 踏青, treading the new grass. Everything this week is out there today, for free. Tell the parents on Friday afternoon:

• Look UP. The trees are only just in leaf, so a nest from last year is still easy to see in a bare fork. Point, don't touch.
• Look DOWN. Any pond, any puddle: something lives in it. Watch the water for one whole minute before you decide it is empty.
• Look in the corners. A doorway, a fence, a gate — a web with the morning wet still on it is the best thing a three-year-old will see all weekend.
• Bring one thing back for the nest-building tray: a twig, a feather, a scrap of dry moss. One each is plenty.

If your Monday does run (a make-up day, or a class that is in): don't start the theme. Go outside and do the looking. Then Tuesday opens exactly as written and they arrive already full of it.

Next Coming back

We start on Tuesday 6 April with Animal Habitats. First circle back: the box is heavier than it looks and smells faintly of the outside, and inside it is a real bird's nest. Every child holds it with two hands before a single word is taught.

2 min Magic Box hook

Today the box is light and it smells faintly of outside. Hold it up. Whole class chants:

Shake it — a dry little rustle, nothing solid. Lift the lid a crack and sniff, loudly, eyes shut. Sniff again. Let your face go amazed.

The nest goes right round the circle on two hands and every child holds it. Hands cupped into a bowl: “Nest!”

Say it once, plainly: nobody is at home in this nest, which is why we may hold it. A nest with eggs in it is looked at from far away and never touched.

4 min Teach · Nest, then Den

Everybody makes a nest with their own two hands. We say it twice — small and slow, then big:

Then the second thing. The box is not empty — there is a flap in the side of a shoebox and the room goes quiet while you open it. Inside, curled up, a fox.

Littles do the two gestures and the two words: “Nest!” “Den!” Bigs owe you the frame: “The bird lives in a nest.” “The fox lives in a den.”

Teacher fails: try to put the fox into the nest. Push. Wedge him in. Stand back, delighted with yourself. Wait. They will take him off you and put him back where he belongs, and they will tell you why.

Chinese moment: lay the 窝 card beside the nest and the 洞 card beside the den, and say 鸟窝 and 狐狸洞 once each. Leave both cards out; the row grows by one card a day and stands finished on Friday.

3 min Song · Where Do You Live? — chorus + Tuesday's verse

The one song of the week — same chorus at every circle, one new verse each morning, the whole thing on Friday. This week's Tuesday verse is the long one, because Tuesday is carrying two homes. Chords and the full sheet are on the Song tab.

3 min Game · Nest hunt

“One, two, three — eyes on me!” The empty nest sits in the middle of the mat. Five eggs are hidden round the room, two of them in plain sight at knee height for the littlest ones.

One egg per child, carried in two hands and laid in the nest — not dropped. Littles say “Nest!” as they lay it down; Bigs give the sentence: “The egg lives in the nest.” Count them into the nest out loud together: one, two, three, four, five.

Then, with the last two minutes, animal-home charades: you call a home, they do the way in. Den — crawl in low. Nest — fly up and land. Pond — swim down. (Pond is tomorrow; let them meet the word here first.)

Five eggs, five and no more — the nest on the shelf tray is built to hold exactly five, and that is its control of error all week.

1 min Close

Everybody's hands cupped into a nest. Whisper → normal → shout:

Got 3 spare minutes? A Nest Is Noisy (Dianna Hutts Aston) — page after page of nests that are nothing like each other. Or just take the nest to the window and look for the real one outside.

2 min Magic Box hook

Today the box is heavy, and you carry it with two hands and a worried face. Whole class chants:

Do not shake it. Tell them you can't. Tip it a few degrees instead — and something inside sloshes. Do it again. Let them hear it.

The jar goes round the circle, held in two hands, and every child looks through it. One hand swimming like a fish: “Pond!”

4 min Teach · Pond

Everybody's hand becomes a fish. We say it twice — slow and deep, then quick:

Now the true thing, said slowly, with the jar in your hands: a nest is no good to a fish and a pond is no good to a bird. Hold the nest up beside the jar so they can see both at once. The right home for the right animal — that is the whole week in one picture.

Littles swim one hand and say “Pond!” Bigs owe you the frame: “The fish lives in the pond.” “The fish does not live in a nest!”

Teacher fails: take the little fox from yesterday's den and lower him, very carefully, into the jar. Look pleased. Hold it. Wait for the roar.

Chinese moment: the 池 card joins 窝 and 洞 on the mat — 池塘. Then one line of 《小蝌蚪找妈妈》: the little tadpole swimming round the pond asking everybody 你是我妈妈吗？ One line only, then stop — the tadpole is looking for exactly what we are: the right home.

3 min Song · Where Do You Live? — chorus + Wednesday's verse

Sing this verse low — drop your voice as the hand goes down, and come back up bright for the chorus. Yesterday's nest-and-den verse comes back too if you have the breath; two verses and a chorus is still only three minutes.

3 min Game · Magnet fishing

“One, two, three — eyes on me!” The basin is the pond, the paper fish are floating in it, and there is one rod. Towel down first.

Every catch is said out loud before it is put down: “The fish lives in the pond.” Littles hold the fish up and say “Pond!” — a full win. Everybody gets one turn; the ones waiting count the catches out loud.

One rod, one turn, and the rest of the class watching is the point — this game is really a lesson in waiting, and the fishing is the sugar. If the water goes everywhere, that is what the towel is for; do not stop the game to mop.

1 min Close

Everybody's hand swimming. Whisper → normal → shout:

Got 3 spare minutes? Leave the jar pond on the window sill and look at it again at the end of the day. Ask what has moved. Something always has.

2 min Magic Box hook

Today the box makes no sound at all, however hard you shake it. Whole class chants:

Shake — nothing. Shake harder — still nothing. Sniff — nothing. Now lift the lid and go completely still.

The web goes round the circle held by the frame, never touched in the middle. Ten fingers spread wide: “Web!”

4 min Teach · Web

Ten fingers up, spread as wide as they will go. Twice — slowly, then fast:

Then the plain true thing: the bird collected her nest, the fox dug his den — but the spider makes her whole house out of herself, in one night, and if it breaks she makes another one. Say it once. Let it sit there.

Littles spread ten fingers and say “Web!” Bigs owe you the frame: “The spider lives in a web.” “The spider made her own home.”

Teacher fails: announce that you will now make a web, out of yourself, exactly like a spider. Strain. Go red. Produce nothing whatsoever. Ask them, wounded, what you are doing wrong.

Chinese moment: the 网 card joins the row — 蜘蛛网. Four cards now: 窝 · 洞 · 池 · 网, and tomorrow the fifth one finishes it. Say all four together, pointing, quickly.

3 min Song · Where Do You Live? — chorus + Thursday's verse

Sing this one almost still — only the winding finger moves — and then explode back into the chorus. Tomorrow the whole song goes top to bottom, so tell them that today: four verses, and tomorrow we sing all of them.

3 min Game · Weave the web

“One, two, three — eyes on me!” Everybody sits in a circle, cross-legged, knees nearly touching. You hold the ball of wool.

The ball rolls across the circle, child to child, each one keeping hold of their bit. Say the name every time. Slowly the whole class becomes one enormous web, and then everybody lifts it together, gently, off the floor. Look at it. Bounce the spider on it if you have a light one.

Littles just hold their thread and say “Web!” Bigs say who they are sending it to: “I send my thread to Leo.”

Wind the ball back up together at the end, child by child, in reverse — it takes one extra minute and it is the calmest minute of the day. Do not cut the wool.

1 min Close

Everybody's ten fingers spread wide. Whisper → normal → shout:

Got 3 spare minutes? The Very Busy Spider (Eric Carle) — every animal asks her to come and play and she just keeps building. It is the same lesson as the whole week and they can feel the web on the page.

2 min Magic Box hook

The box comes out bulging and will not quite shut.

Pull each home out and stand it on the mat in silence. They will supply the word before you can.

The nest → “Nest!”  The shoebox → “Den!”  The jar → “Pond!”  The hoop → “Web!”

Four homes in a row on the mat. Then tip the basket of animals out in the middle, in a heap. Nobody lives anywhere yet.

4 min Teach · Live, then the whole week

Everybody stands. We tell the whole week with our bodies, twice — slow, then fast:

Then, one at a time, round the circle: every child picks one animal out of the heap and walks it to the home it belongs in. Nobody is corrected out loud — if it goes in the wrong place, ask the class: “Is the fish happy in there?”

Littles carry the animal and say the one word: “Pond!” Bigs owe you the whole sentence as they set it down: “The fish lives in the pond.” Then the last question, to every single child by name: “Where do you live?”

Teacher fails: pick up the spider and announce that she is going to live in the jar pond from now on, because it is nicer. Start unscrewing the lid. Wait.

Chinese moment: the 家 card finishes the row — 窝 · 洞 · 池 · 网 · 家. 家 is the one that matters: home. Point at each child and say 我的家, and let them say it back. Then tell them the whole row is going up on the wall.

3 min Song · Where Do You Live? — Friday's verse, then the WHOLE song

The finale: chorus → Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday → chorus, standing round the four homes with every animal in its right place. Four verses, learned one a morning without anybody noticing, and this run-through is the review of the whole week.

3 min Game · Who lives here?

“One, two, three — eyes on me!” Quick-fire, and fast is the whole point. You hold up one animal; they shout the home. Then you hold up one home; they shout the animal.

Then throw in one wrong one on purpose — hold up the fish and say “nest?” with a hopeful face — and let them shout you down. Finish on the one that is not a trick: “Where do you live?” and every child gets to answer, in any language, in any number of words.

Keep it under two minutes. The moment it slows down, stop it and do the awards — a quick-fire that outstays its welcome loses everything it just proved.

1 min Close + awards

Every child gets a “You are a STAR!” award to take home with the wrap-up. Then, standing round the four homes with the animals all in their right places:

Got 3 spare minutes? Leave the four homes out over the weekend and tell them the nest stays up in the classroom all month. Next week is The Earth — the biggest home of the lot, and it is the one everybody in this room shares.

The three chords

Tempo: easy and walking-pace, with a real stop after “where do you live?” so the class can answer into the gap. Three chords, no Am this week, and every verse is only C and G7. Chant it without the uke first; add the chords once they know the actions.

Chorus — sing it every single day

Sing the chorus twice each time, and leave a real silence after the question — somebody will always fill it. The actions are the whole point: a two-year-old who opens her hands on the question and makes a roof on “home” has understood the week, whether or not a single word comes out.

One verse a day — four days, four verses

The build: each day sing chorus → today's verse → chorus. This is a four-day week (清明 on the Monday), so Tuesday's verse carries both the nest and the den and there are four verses in all — and Friday's finale, sung standing round the four homes with every animal in its right place, is the review of the whole week.

If you're brand new to ukulele

Practice this loop for five minutes tonight: C (4 strums) → F (4 strums) → C → G7 → C. That is the entire chorus, and the whole song is those three shapes — there is no Am this week at all. C is one finger, F is two, G7 is three; learn them in that order. If your fingers get stuck, put the uke down, hold the nest up in both hands and do the finger-play instead: the class will not notice, and the actions carry the meaning either way.