Afternoon on the Amazon

After Jack and Annie spent an afternoon in the Amazon rainforest dodging mangos and facing perhanas, crocodiles, vampire bats, and army ants, we spent some time learning more about rainforests.  We assembled a book filled with the things we learned.

Here were our activities...

1. On our book cover we glued a map marking the rainforests of the world.  We made a small dot marking where we live and I even showed them where Rio is because that's one of the kids' all-time favorite movies. 

2. Then we reviewed the layers of the rainforest trees and added on the description and a short list of animals that live in each part. I'd read aloud the description and they'd guess where it belonged.

3. We learned about the different animals that live in the rainforest. The kids colored and cut out all the animals on a worksheet from here. (just sign up your email and you get a whole list of different theme worksheets you can download) They worked hard on this page. Eli especially took time really coloring each picture and cutting closely around the edge of each one.

4. Then we learned about some of the foods that come from the rainforest. I did the cutting for them this time (while they were working on the last page)

5. And the people that actually live there. I didn't want to go into all the details of their lifestyle, but the pictures give a glimpse. Just wanted them to know there are people there with a whole different way of life.

6. The rainforests are in danger and are being cut or burned down.

Our complete book

7. I happened to have some mango peach juice so we finished with a lil treat. It was a perfect ending.

 Then as they were finishing, I was asking them questions about what we just learned. And because it's fun to see them raise their hands I'd say Raise your hand if you can name a fruit that grows in the rainforest... name an animal that lives in the rainforest... Why is the rainforest in danger? Name a way that we can help.

I'd say it was a fun afternoon!

Click HERE to download the food, people, and danger pages.

More rainforest activities and worksheets are HERE.
And questions to answer as you read through the book (and other Tree House books) are HERE.