Kindergarteners are so eager to learn and share their views and ideas. I love getting to bring yoga into their classrooms each week. Although I always plan to bring enriching lessons to their education, I ALWAYS find that I am the one who gains so much inspiration and knowledge from watching and listening to them. This week, my lesson theme was BE HAPPY WHO YOU ARE. We read The Mixed-Up Chameleon by Eric Carle. All of his books are so conducive to introducing in a kids yoga class. The students loved becoming “part of the book.” All of the animals that the chameleon wished he could be where brought to life through yoga poses:
ANIMAL: POSE:
Polar Bear Down Dog and walk around on hands and feet
Flamingo Tree pose with your hands on your shoulders to make the wings
Turtle Child’s pose and rest in shell
Elephant Stand with feet apart, clasp hands together and swing side to side
Fox Down Dog and lift one leg in the air to wag your fluffy tail
Giraffe Stand tall on your toes with your arms reaching high towards the sky
Seal Lay on stomach, arms extended in front of face and clap hands
Chameleon Slither on stomach and extend tongue to catch a fly
There are even eye exercises in the book: The chameleon moves its eyes up and down and sideways while keeping his body still…….in order to catch the fly.
Practice tongue movements, pretending to catch your fly. Move your tongue in/out, up/down and all around.
After we read the book, every student created their own page to a classroom book titled,
THE MIXED-UP KINDERGARTEN
Each student picked an attribute that they like about themselves and then picked an animal that also is like that attribute……such as:
I am happy like a seal
I am brave like a polar bear
I am kind like a flamingo.
I printed out a sheet with 6 positive attributes such as happy, funny, kind, brave,…
When the sentences were done, they became the illustrators as well.
Some other ideas to add to your exploration of this book can be found at
http://www.eric-carle.com/bb-chameleon.html
Animal pictures to go with the story:
http://storytime-storytime.blogspot.com/2009/02/mixed-up-chameleon.html
The children LOVED this lesson…..and so did the teachers. We worked on self-esteem, gross/fine motor skills, coordination, space/body awareness, phonics, reading, writing, cutting, gluing….the lessons are endless.
