This Sea Unit is one of my favorites. It was compiled by Margaret Richins, a friend whom does the best theme unit seminars. If you would like to see something added to these pages please e-mail me at dlayton@mo-net.com. Please sign my guestbook for using our ideas. teach away! Miss Lisa

Most of the earth is covered by oceans. Tiny animals and plants, called plankton, live suspended in the sea. Many different types of fish live in the oceans. Whales are mammals that live in the sea but they breath air. Many plants and animals live on the ocena floor such as crabs, starfish, and rays. The octopus has eight long arms and eats other sea animals. Sponges, corals and other types of sea life are very interesting. People eat many kinds of fish. Fishermen use nets to catch some sea animals for food. Divers wear masks over their noses and eyes. They carry air in tanks on their backs. They wear rubber flippers on their feet to help them move faster through the water. Many boats and ships can float and travel on water. Submarines are ships that can go underwater as well as on top of the sea.

Concepts:

1. Ocean water is salty.
2. There are many animals that live under the sea.
3. Some sea animals live in shells.
4. Each animal has special body parts to help him move through the water.
5. People or things can be carried over the water in a boat or ship.
6. The captain and the crew help the boat or ship move through the water.
7. Buoys and light houses help the crew to know where to safely sail the ship.
8. Submarines can submerge and move below the surface of the water.
9. Fishers are people who go out in boats to catch fish, lobsters, crabs and shrimp.
10. People eat many animals that live in the sea.

A. Beautiful Fish--- Cut paper in the shpe of a fish. Have the children use liquid starch as glue to attach different colors of tissue to their fish. Then sprinkle blue and green glitter lightly over the tissue covered fish. These look beautiful on a bulletin board with no more than a few strips of green paper to simulate seaweed as a background.

B. Stuffed Whale--- Cut out a large whale shape, two for each child. Have the children sponge or object paint on their whales. Stuff the whales with news- paper and staple them together. These can be hung from the ceiling. C. Seascape--- Cut fish and seaweed from paper. Provide sand, small rocks, shell macaronik ans styrofoam packing. Create seascape by gluing materials to blue construction paper.

D. Underwater Scene--- Draw underwater scene with crayons. Paint over under- water scene with a thin wash of blue tempera.

E. Starfish--- Cut starfish from large piece of heavy paper. Cover with glue. Now, sprinkle sand over the starfish. Remove excess sand.

F. Paper Plate Fish--- Cut triangular piece from paper plate for tail fin. Draw scales and eyes on the fish.

G. Fish Print--- Obtain a whole fish from the butcher. Apply ink to one side of the fish and print it onto a piece of paper.

H. Walnut Shell Boats---- Stick a round toothpick through a piece of other end of the toothpick to the bottom of the walnut shell with any kind of playdough that dries hard.

I. Clay Whales--- Make a whale out of natural clay. Let them dry or bake them in a kiln. Paint them with tempera cakes.

J. Sea Creatures--- Cut out fish and other marine life shapes, such as starfish, octopus, seahorse, etc. Have the children crayone melt on these shapes.

K. Sponge Print Fish--- Cut sponges in the shape of fish and other sea creatures. Mount them on old blocks. Dip them in paint and print them onto large paper.

L. Easel Fish--- Paint on fish or marine life shapes at the easel.

M. Chalk Seashells--- Cut sea shell Shapes out of white paper. Color them with large colored chalk. Use a tissue to rub and blend the color.

N. Sea Stencils--- Give the children stencils of sea creatures. Let them trace the shapes onto white paper with magiv markers. Then, each shape can be cut out and decorated if desire.

O. Fish bowls--- Cut out a large fish bowl shape. Let the children paint fish in their bowl.

A. Fill the table with sand and sea shells. Large clam shells make excellent scoopers. B. Fill the table with water, boats, divers, rubber fish and octopus's. C. Fill the table with water. Color it with blue food coloring. Put sponge fish in the table to catch with clothespins.

A. Provide boats and fish cut out of vinyl samples. Encourage the children to build marinas. B. Outline a row boat on the floor with hollow blocks lying on their long edges. Provide sailor hats. C. Make a dock with unit blocks. Set out small model ships and boats for encouraging this kind of play.

A. Put the rocking boat in the pretend area. Provide sailor hats, magnetic fishing poles, and colored fish with paper clips on them. B. Provide vinyl fish and frying pans. C. Sun and Fun Box--- Prepare a box with items often used at the beach. Some examples are sun hat, sunglasses, sun visors, beach towels, beach balls, fins, goggles and a camera. Allow time for creative play.

1.) Octopus Classification--- Make an octopus out of tagboard. Make cards to sort according to eight categories, such as body parts, clothes, things with wheels, etc. Have the children sort each category onto a different arm of the octopus.

2.) Shell count--- Make counting cards out of blue poster board. Put a brown beach on one half of each card. Put a number on the beach and a number on the ocean. Have the children count small shells onto each board and add their two sets together to see how many shells they have total.

3.) Jaws--- Draw a shark on tagboard. Draw and cut out small fish and the number them. Have the children feed the fish to jaws in numerical order.

4.) Feed Me Fish--- Cut a large fish shape out of paper. Decorate and laminate. Cut a hole for the fish's mouth. Mount him with tape on a milk carton with a corresponding hole. Feed small pepperidge farm goldfish to the big fish. As a dismissal ask each child to feed the fish a different number of little fish.

5.) Fish tail match--- Make poster board fish with dots on the body and the corresponding numeral on the tail. Cut apart and laminate. Have the children match the tail to the correct fin.

6.) Frying Fish--- Make posterboard fish with numberals on them. Put a paper clip on each one. Make frying pans with dots to correspond to the numerals on the fish. Use magnetic fishing poles to catch the fish then "fry" them in the correct pan.

7.) Fish dots--- Cover a coffee can with solid contact paper. Put the numerals 1 thru 12 on the outside. Make cards with fish stickers and certian number of dots on each one. For older childre, you could write simple equations on the cards. Put magnetic tape on the back of each card. Have the children count the dots or solve the equation and put the correct fish card on the right numeral. Store the cards in a zip loc bag inside of the coffee can.

8.) Balancing shells--- Provide a balance scale and shells of different shapes and sizes. Let the children experiment so that they can discover which are the heaviest, lightest or about the same in weight.

9.) Size sort--- Provide a varitey of shells to sort into the categories small, med., and large.

1.) Don't tickle a trout--- Put a vinyl fish on the floor between two jump ropes. Jump across the rope "brook" without falling in. Each time someone jumpes, the ropes are moved farther apart. Don't fall in and tickel the trout! 2.) Swimming Fish--- Pretend to be a fish swimming in the water. What type of fish do you want to be? Lie on your stomach with you arms close to your side. Wiggle your body and try to move. Describe what you would see under the water.

1.) Eat fish sticks with ketchup.

2.) Fish cookies--- Cut fish shapes out of sugar dough. Sprinkle them with green sugar sprinkles.

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