Thursday, January 13, 2011

Trekking across The States - Alabama




Welcome to the first stop in our Trek across The States. To begin our journey, we used our boarding pass, hopped on our makeshift plane and landed in ALABAMA. Channing was so excited and we found out so many cool things!




We colored a map of Alabama, found out that the State bird is a Yellowhammer (named after the soldiers in the Civil War who had yellow trim on their uniform) and the State flower is a pretty Camellia.



We found out lots of interesting facts about Yellowhammers......did you know that they eat more ants than any other kind of bird in the USA? So of course I had to make a counting game to go along with it :-)






We also painted a Yellowhammer and added yellow feathers.


While cotton is not the MAJOR crop in Alabama anymore (it is still a BIG crop), the State was once was known as "the King of Cotton". We glued some cotton balls on a map of Alabama and then drew 3 pictures of things we use cotton for - I was quite impressed that Channing could think of 3 things himself!






We also made a very pretty Camellia craft. Channing is going through a weird "I will not have a picture unless I hold the paper in my mouth" phase - funny kid!




We also looked at the Sate Flag and touched on some famous people that were born in Alabama (like Helen Keller and Georger Washington Carver).




I also made some 3 part cards to go along with our Alabama adventure (they include the flag, a map, the Monarch butterfly, yellowhammer, Camellia, state quarter, Helen Keller and George Washington Carver). .




We did all of these activities in conjunction with our Space unit as it was Space scientists in Huntsville who helped send astronauts to the moon! We did some great crafts to go along with our space theme but I'll post about them next week.




I had great plans of making some "sweet potato biscuits" but ran out of time....bummer 'cause they sounded so good!






Before you get ready to board the plane again and head out to Alaska, head over to Montessori Tidbits to see what they did to learn about Alabama.




From Next week on, our "Trekking across the Sates" will be posted on Sundays....so look out for them. If you're joining us and do some other interesting activities, please email me and I'd be happy to add a link to your post :-)


The cute graphics I used to make the "Trekking" button are from Scrappin Doodles. Thank you Denise for allowing me to use them!











15 comments:

Sigalit Chana said...

Thank you for sharing your hard work with us. I was wondering if you plan to have a button for the trekking across the states button? Or if you mind me making one to put on my blog, using the eagle and flag picture at the beginning of your post? Let me know. Thanks again:D

Alison @ Educational Creations said...

Do you have items for Texas? I would love for my Missy Mu-Mu to send you all a postcard! It would be a neat little project for her.

You can contact me through my blog if interested!

Mrs. Whary said...

Hey there Sigalit Chana, would you mind emailing me at musingsofme@yahoo.com.......I tried to find your email on your web page but I couldn't find it anywhere :-)

Anonymous said...

Thank you for sharing! I LOVE your blog and printables. I live in Alabama and plan to incorporate this with my pre-k class at some point. We have been out all week with 8 inches of snow....hoping to go back tomorrow. I miss my kiddos!

Mrs. Saoud said...

My class would love to mail you a postcard the week you investigate Florida. Let me know... Happy Adventures!

Lynn said...

Great ideas!! Thanks for sharing. Can't wait to start doing this with my boys.

Anonymous said...

oo how fun!! Looks like Channing had fun! The camellia craft turned out super cute!

Mihaela { Best Toys 4 Toddlers } said...

Hi Michelle!

Forwarding you Stylish Blogger Award! Enjoy! :)
http://willowatsquidoo.blogspot.com/2011/01/stylish-blogger-award.html

Rebecca said...

Wow, this is awesome!! Ive been wanting to do a state study with my preschooler Connor and this would be PERFECT to do next year for our Kindergarten studies. THANKS for sharing! Im going to bookmark and hopefully by then you will have lots more states done! Im so excited- ha!

Faith said...

Hello there! Wow what a blessing it was to find your blog! You have so many great printables and ideas! Thank you for sharing them with us! If you need anything from Florida, let me know and I would be happy to mail them to you!

Jessica said...

HELLO!!! I love your blog! OK this is truly wonderful. I can't get over how great your blog is. I love the activities and am printing off a ton of pages as I type. THANK-YOU THANK-YOU for putting the time into sharing these glorious ideas:)

The Allgaiers said...

My kids (6, 4, 2) LOVED doing Alabama. They got a real kick out of our pretend airplane trip and all the activities you made. Thank you! Do you know when Alaska will be ready??

Jennifer

Mrs. Whary said...

Fantasic - glad you liked them :-) I'll be posting Alaska on Sunday.......I'll post each unit each Sunday from now on :-) Alaska is fun but there is a LOT - we're busy working on it :-)

Elle Belles Bows said...

Great job!! Love how you did the little project for the yellowhammer! Kerri

Brandi said...

I'm just gathering everything to start The Trek with my son. I wanted to ask if you could include the books you're reading for each state. I went to the library and had trouble finding enough to make a "book basket." I wondered if you had suggestions you could share with us. I so appreciate everything you've provided for us-it is all fabulous!
Thank you.