Large Group Literacy: Forest Animals

My unit on forest animals depends on how the week falls.  Usually I do a full five days and focus on Brown Bear Brown Bear during LGL.  This past year was a four day week so I did the following activities:

Forest Animals List
Students try to name as many animals as they can think of to be added to chart paper by the teacher.

Owl Babies Big Book Reading
Big Books are wonderful opportunities to demonstrate tracking print to students.  The repetitive statement by the youngest owlet will have them participating in the reading process.

Tree Observational Drawings
Using paper on clipboards, students will walk around the school and draw what they observe of the trees on campus.

Retelling of Teddy Bear, Teddy Bear poem
I enjoy celebrating the end of our time learning about forest animals with a Teddy Bear Picnic.  So with our teddy bears that we brought in, we act out the Teddy Bear, Teddy Bear poem.

Brown Bear, Brown Bear Picture Walk
Go through each page of the book from cover to end.  Allow students to take turns suggesting what they believe is happening on each page.  I recommend no more than three suggestions per page or students begin to get off track in the activity.

Brown Bear, Brown Bear Big Book Reading
Since yesterday we guessed what was happening on each page, today we read it!  What will the words tell us is happening this time?
Again, pointing to each word and tracking print demonstration for students.

Brown Bear retelling using props
There are many prop options for retelling; flannel board, puppets, different colored smocks for students to wear labeled with each animals' name.  Buy something, make something, create something new.. One year I was in a rush and wrote the animals' names on their matching color of construction paper for students to hold.  Whatever works for you, your students, and your budget.

Favorite Brown Bear Animal
This activity focuses on writing.  You can either make it a graph for students to write their name under the animal of choice OR you can give each student a sheet of paper to draw the animal themselves.  This gives you a whole group project that can be displayed in your hallway or on a bulletin board AND gives you an excellent work sample for "shows an appreciation for both books an reading" and other Language and Literacy indicators.

Brown Bear, Brown Bear/Bear Hunt Comparison Chart
This activity focuses on characters, setting, and plot of stories.  I make the chart on the board: Title, Characters, Setting, Plot.  I explain to the students what each word means before we attempt to fill in those sections for Brown Bear, Brown Bear.  Title, the name of the book.  Characters, WHO was in the story.  Setting, WHERE did the story happen.  Plot, WHAT happened.  Then I read Bear Hunt (you can replace for any other bear-focused title, I recommend a short tale).  We then go back to our chart and fill in for Bear Hunt to compare similarities and differences between the two books.