We learned that bats are nocturnal just like owls and they sleep upside down! We tried hanging upside down. Pretty sure we could never sleep in that position! We sang to the tune of "Are You Sleeping?" as we hung:
Bats are sleeping.
Bags are sleeping.
Upside down.
Upside down.
Sleeping in the daytime.
Waiting for the nighttime.
To fly around.
Fly around.
We read Stellaluna,
the story of a cute little fruit bat that got separated from her mother and had to live with a family of birds. It was fun to compare birds and bats and the way they live.
We put on a puppet show with five little bats and their mama.
We sang and acted out to the tune of "Five Little Ducks":
Five little bats went on a flight
by the light of the moon one night.
Mama bat said, "Squeak, squeak, squeak, swack!"
but only 4 little bats came back.
Four little...
Three little...
Two little...
One little...
No little ducks went on a flight
by the light of the moon one night.
Mama bat said, "Squeak, squeak, squeak, squack!"
Five little bats came flying back.
Can you guess who the mama bat was?
At our math table was a game of "I Spy Bats". On the mat were bats flying and perching in caves and trees. We had cards with the names of the bats and a bit about it. We had to match the card to the bat on the mat.
Bat stories were told at the writing table, with a collection of Halloween bats, glow-in-the-dark and a mat with a cave and a tree.
Koosh balls were dipped in Halloween colors of tempera paint and printed on bat shapes and a dark night sky for some spooky bats.
Some bats eat insects and some eat fruit (all but vampire bats who eat blood- blech!). We pretended we were fruit eating bats like Stellaluna. We made yummy fruit kabobs for lunch. This was quite a yummy fine motor activity.
To be fair to insect eating bats without having to eat bugs, we learned how they echolocate to find their food. They send out high-pitched sounds (we used a whistle) that bounce off objects and return to them, helping them gather information, like the size and location of the object (the bug!).
One of us was the bat- blindfolded with a whistle. The rest of us were insects (with rattles). The bat whistled and listened for the rattle sound, moving towards the sound to find its food.
Just for fun and because Halloween is coming, we read the silly book, There Was an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Bat.
And now, we're headed to the pumpkin patch...
