I can’t even remember what inspired this, I know my son thought of it but I can’t remember now what preceded me saying ” How about making animal tracks?”. All I remember is that he bounded to the table, which is not always the case . This is a fast project, to stretch it out introduce new paint colors , new animals and more paper one at a time.
- Gather your materials. You will need some fun toy animals, a plate, paper,markers and paint.
- If you want you or your child can draw some scenery.
- Spread some paint on your plate and dip your animal in.
- Start making some tracks.
- Add the next paint color and more paper if you want and keep going.
* After we painted we went for a walk outside and pretended to look for and follow animal tracks. We tippy toed for mouse tracks , hopped for bunny tracks and stomped around the patio when we “found” elephant ones. *Books !
” Animalia” by Graeme Base is iconic in teaching circles, you can loose yourself for hours in the detailed illustrations. The book is an alphabet book on steroids! Each page had a wonderful paragraph in each letter such as for the letter L ” Lazy Lions lounging in the local library.” The pages are filled to the gills with pictures of things that start with that letter as well. Parents and kids a like will fall in love!
“Peek-a-Zoo!”by Marie Torres Cimarusti is a vibrant lift the flap book that goes through sounds different animals make while playing peek a boo with the reader. What I like about this book is that the flaps offer a chance for your baby or toddler to anticipate what animal it hiding as well as the sound , so it grows with them. Also the flaps are large enough that little hands can grab them and won’t get frustrated.
“Is Your Mama a Llama? “ by Deborah Guarino is a classroom favorite, I don’t know many preschool teachers who can’t recite most of this book . Readers follow Lloyd the llama as he riddles his way through a bunch of animals until he find the one he calls mom. I like the mix of animals in this book, a little different than your average zoo or farm collection.
“Is Your Mama a Llama? “ by Deborah Guarino is a classroom favorite, I don’t know many preschool teachers who can’t recite most of this book . Readers follow Lloyd the llama as he riddles his way through a bunch of animals until he find the one he calls mom. I like the mix of animals in this book, a little different than your average zoo or farm collection.
pucktricks says
What a fun idea!
Emily says
Cute idea! My little artists will love this!
Amy @ Literacy Launchpad says
This is neat. It would be even cooler if there were some animal toys out there that had more authentic looking paw prints. Ya know? Anybody know of any?
Allie says
I used to have a Simba ( The Lion King) stamp that looked like a toy but had paw prints on his feet. I am sure you could search a stamp store for something like that. I am going to go check Lakeshore Learning now- I’ll update if I find something!
Annette says
Great idea!!
Kris says
What a cute idea. Never knew or thought you could make tracks with those animals. Teachers should love this!
Happy VGNO by the way.
Amanda @ Mommy's Idea Book says
What a great idea! My son would love to do this, and it is so easy to do. Thanks so much for sharing this project idea.
Where's The Aspirin? says
Very cute idea. The kids will love it.
Infant Bibliophile says
That Animalia cover looks instantly familiar, but I haven’t read it in ages. Thanks for the reminder! “Is Your Mama a Lllama” was the first book I bought for our bookworm…I read it in the womb to him a bunch of times, and he won’t sit through it once! But hopefully when he cares more about the words he will like it. Another one we love is “Dear Zoo” lift the flap book.
Preschool Playbook says
Isn’t “Is Your Mama a Llama?” a great book?
Allie says
Yes it really is a great book, it’s flow is amazing, a great read aloud for sure!
mer and justin says
I came to your site looking for ideas for a zoo animal theme. This is a great idea. We will try it this week.
ps says
I love the small animals you have- if you don’t mind sharing the brand and where you got them, I would really appreciate that…
Allie says
They are little people animals from the Noah’s ark set, however at Traget there are tons of inexpensive play animals that would be great for this too!
Infant Bibliophile says
there’s an award for you on my site…
Katalin says
Animal tracks are fun to make in play doh too… they really show up well! We recently re-created the Jungle Book with play doh, a couple tigers, elephants, and playmobil guys. When I tried this out with my boys, they had a blast painting their animals too. They were so pretty, I didn’t want to wash them off! Thanks for the idea!
Shruti Goradia says
Cute idea. I especially like how you extended it by going outside and pretended to look for/follow and enact animal tracks.
.-= Shruti Goradia´s last blog ..Made me stop and look =-.
Ashlyn Brunson says
We have TONS of little people animals…some doubles. This would be a great activity for the doubles so that we don’t ruin the nice ones. Thanks for the crafts! 🙂
office wall art says
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