Kids are very observant and it shows when they talk to you about things they have seen or heard or even correct your sentences for you! So how keen is their observation when it comes to animals and their tails ?? Let’s find out.

Inspired by the classic game of “ Pin the tail on the donkey”, I decided to take it up a notch . Let’s do it with different animals.

TAILS : What’s so interesting about them? They are all so different, some are long, some short, some bushy, some straight , some curvy and some straight !

 It’s time for our “Ask Questions” segment:

1. Why do animals have tails?
2. Why do animals need tails?
3. Why do they look so different?

The goal was simple, to see if Big S can find the matching tail for the animal. It looks and sounds very simple but  it’s quite a mental workout for a preschooler.

To keep things interesting for her and to keep her involved in the project I started by letting her color the animal templates we printed. Now you may wonder why the animals are so colorful and here’s my story –

Big S wanted to color with her dear daddy and I told her – “You can use the new Mix ‘em markers and make different colors” .Little did I know that it would translate as “ Make your animals colorful” . Both daddy and daughter had fun making colorful animals , anything for fun right?

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1. Write the name tags for the animals
2. Cut the animal figure template , separating the tail from the body
3. Arrange into 2 piles – “Heads” & “Tails”
4. Set up the name tags  and the board pins

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Now if there’s a younger sibling, you might want to make sure that the board pins are at a safe distance from the baby’s reach.

ROUND 1

I pinned the heads on the board

Big S’s task – Find the matching tail for the animal and also find the name tag.

ROUND 2

I pinned the Name tag

 Big S’s task – Find the animal parts.

ROUND 3

I pinned the tail

 Big S’s task – Find the body and identify the animal

Can you think of a few ways to expand the game and learning – jumble the letters on the name tag and ask them to fish for the letters.

Once the game and learning was done, the real fun had just begun – mixing the heads and their tails to make new creatures ! We even named a few hybrid species – Camouse (cat + mouse) , Okey (otter + turkey), Dotter (dog + otter), and Ponkey ( pig + monkey) !

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• Animals and their parts – Hind legs, fore legs and Tails
• Spellings
• Word building
• Reading skills
• Phonics
• Concept of – Front and Back, Before and After
• Fine motor skills
• Gross Motor Skills

TAIL FACTS

Different animals use their tails for different purposes

• Fish- Swim
• Cows, horses – Brush away insects that bite them .
• Dogs – Communicate – they wag to tell you if they are happy, sad or stressed
• Kangaroos, Porcupines, Alligator – Defense
• Cat, squrriel – Balance
• Monkeys – Grab and Climb

Did you know that some animals can grow their tails again if it breaks off – Lizards and Geckos can.

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Please note that we did not do all the “rounds” on the same day.

Thanks for reading

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We are linking up with Angelique Felix