Flannel Friday: Animal Pairs

I am cheating! Totally! Today’s Flannel Friday is a pattern that I’ve already shared, on my Beyond Five Little Whatsits post. But I’m updating the file, since I noticed one of the animals was missing (whoops), and adding some other ideas for how to use these pieces, so that’s how I’m making it up to you.

Today we’ve got Animal Pairs. It’s very simple, just a big animal and a little animal that match. Here’s what you can do with them!

Little Bear, Where Is Your Mama?

Put four of the big animals up on the flannelboard. Then hold up one of the little ones, and say, “Little Bear, where is your mama?” Hold the bear up to some of the other animals one by one. “No, this is not the Mama Bear. This is a seahorse and it is orange….Oh! Here’s the Mama Bear! She looks just like her baby.” Repeat until all the animals have been found.

Matching Game

Hand out all the animals to the kids. If you have more than 16 in your group, you can make more than one set of animals. Then have one child bring their animal to the board. Ask, “Wow, it’s a turtle! Who has another turtle?” When they come up, you can put it on the board and ask, “Is it bigger or littler than the first turtle?” If you’ve got more than one set going, you can have the children group the animals by big and little as they put them on the board.

Guessing Game

Hold all the big animals in your hand. Give the kids clues about the animals one by one. “I’m thinking of an animal, and it lives in the ocean or a lake, and it swims underwater. What is it?” As they guess, put the animal on the board.

Down By the Bay

Sing “Down by the Bay.” For each verse, put an animal on the board: “Did you ever see a….” and let the kids tell you the name of the animal: “Snail!” Then, finish the verse. You can either just make up a rhyme yourself, or stop and have the kids help you think of a rhyme for each animal. “Snail! Wow! What does ‘snail’ rhyme with? What does it sound like? Pail? OK! ‘Did you ever see a snail carrying a pail / Down by the bay.'”

What else can you do with these guys?

(Ed. 11/11: I am no longer sharing my clip art files due to copyright concerns, so I’ve taken down the link to the files. I found these animal cartoons in Microsoft Word clip art, but they are no longer available there, which is a shame since they are so charming. You can search your favorite clip art sites for animal images you like, then just copy and paste and resize so that one is larger than the other.)