A guide for using our resources

Children will describe walruses and identify reasons they are special.

Science Focus: Arctic animals, animal adaptations

CCSS (and states that have similar standards): RI.1.1, RF.1.2.A, RL.1.1, L.1.1, L.1.4

Simple, spectacular ideas to boost your lessons.

Paired Text: If Wendell Had a Walrus by Lori Mortensen

  • Wendell dreams of all the wonderful things he would do with a walrus, if only he could find one. His tireless search leads to an unexpected happy ending.

Draw the Word: tusks

  • Kids learned the word tusks from the issue. Help make the word “stick” by having kids draw what the word means.
  • Use our Draw the Word skill sheet or have kids draw it in a word journal.

Hands-On Activity: Paper Plate Walrus

Skill: writing

Materials: Walrus Template skill sheets, large paper plates, scissors, craft sticks, glue, brown paint, pipe cleaners, crayons

  • Give each child a copy of the skill sheet and a paper plate. Then have kids paint their plates brown.
  • As the paint dries, have kids color the walrus’s muzzle brown and then cut out the muzzle and eyes. They can also complete the sentence and cut out the sentence strip.
  • When the paint is dry, have children paste the muzzle and eyes to the plate. Have them paste black pipe cleaners to the muzzle for whiskers.
  • Next, have children attach two craft sticks to the back of the paper plate so they hang down as tusks! Then children can attach their sentence strip to the back of the paper plate.
  • Finally, have each child hold the paper plate in front of their face and read their reasonfor loving walruses to a partner or the class!