Every year on February 2nd we celebrate Groundhog Day. As a classroom teacher, I always loved Groundhog Day when it fell during the week and students were in the classroom. It’s just a fun day to talk about traditions, making predictions, and the science behind shadows with the students. The excitement is just grand for them. To help make celebrating Groundhog Day easy, I have put together all the activities you need to learn about the holiday!
One of the easiest ways to bring Groundhog Day fun to the classroom is by making predictions. You can make predictions before Groundhog Day arrives. Then, when everyone returns, you can watch the official live stream of Groundhog Day and see what really happened!
You also can create a class pictograph to log your predictions. You can then discuss the data the graph produces as you analyze it! It’s a great way to squeeze in some math skills!
I’m not sure about you, but where I live, we don’t see groundhogs often. They are such interesting creatures to my students! You can use this time to channel their excitement and learn all about them. You can even discuss groundhog facts! I love using real pictures of this animal. So many of my students have never seen a groundhog before. The true and false fact sort was interesting to them all!
We integrated reading and writing wherever we could!
These hats are the perfect thing to work on fine motor practice with our youngest learners with cutting and coloring! Hat Tip: Use sentence strips to make the band that has been cut in half length-wise.
I always love integrating fun holiday topics in reading and writing. This mini-book is a great way to do that! Explore the history of the holiday and then create the mini-book. This activity can be a great fit for morning work, a literacy center, or independent work. We always liked to put these in our book tubs to be read later during independent reading time, too!
You can find all of these activities to help keep learning alive Groundhog Day inside my mini-unit! Click the image below to check it out.
All of this can be found in my All About Groundhog Day unit. Do you discuss this holiday in your classroom? Do you teach the history behind the holiday? Do you squeeze in science and talk about shadows? I’d love to hear more!
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I’m a K-1 teacher who is passionate about making lessons your students love and that are easy to implement for teachers. Helping teachers like you navigate their way through their literacy block brings me great joy. I am a lifelong learner who loves staying on top of current literacy learning and practices. Here, you’ll find the tools you need to move your K-2 students forward!
4 Responses
Oh my cuteness! Cute baby in a groundhog hat ALERT! 🙂
Thank you!!
Cute unit! I think Groundhog Day is Monday, February 2, 2015.
Theresa!! You are RIGHT! I knew it was February 2, but I TOTALLY forgot there are 31 days in January! I was just counting earlier instead of looking at a calendar. HA! Thank you for catching that! I have fixed my post. 🙂 You’re the best!