Fun Web Sites for K-2:
  Animaland is a wonderful website for children to learn all about animals. It is designed by the ASPCA especially for kids. Through animation and cartoons it shows kids how to care for pets, teaches children about the ASPCA, lists award winning children's books about animals, offers interactive games, and much more. Fun for all ages!

Bow Wow Meow is a site created by Pet-Tags.com that was created to help children pick out a name for their new pet. Kids can also see a list of the most popular pet names, find out what their pet's name means, send pet ecards, calculate how much they should feed their dog or cat, and calculate how old their dog is.

Allpets.com has a kid friendly PetCyclopedia website that offers information for how to care for pets and it is easy for children to recognize the different pets because there are pictures of different animals to click on to find care advice, such as: dogs cats, fish, reptiles, horses, birds, and exotic pets.

The American Veterinary Medical Association has a Kid's Corner that has an animal care activity section for children. It has many printable coloring and activity sheets about pets for children to do a learn about different types of pets. Very fun for younger kids!

Ataboy is a kennel that breeds dogs and they have a kid's page where children can click on different pictures which allow them to play games, color pictures, crossword puzzles, dot to dots, enter contest, and more.

Fun Websites for 3-5:

Petfinder has a great website made just for kids. It has articles for kids to read about how young people make a difference in the lives of animals. The site also offers pet tips, a guide to help locate a pet, games and cards, and section for parents.

The World Almanac for Kids has an Animal section that has tons of amazing facts about all kinds of animals. It is a very educational website that offers lots of interesting information.

PetPlanet's offers a resource page for kids to learn how to care for different kinds of new pets like puppies, kittens, guinea pigs, rabbits, and hamsters. It also has a list of popular pet names, games, jokes, and more.

Neopets is a website for children that allows children to have a virtual Neopet that they create and care for. Having a Neopet can teach children what it is like to have and care for a real pet.

PetEduacation.com is a great place to learn about how to care for different types of pets such as: dogs, cats, fish, birds, ferrets, reptiles, and small pets. This website is very informational and is owned and operated by practicing veterinarians.



Activity for K-2:
Title: Caring for Pets
Grade: K-2
Subject: Literature and Life Science
QCC's: Grade: Kindergarten/Science
            Strand: Life Science
            13 Topic: The Living World: Living Things
          Standard: Recognizes factors leading to the survival of living things. Describes the conditions
            affecting survival of species, including changes in climate, availability of shelter, food, air, water,
            and human encroachment.

           Grade: Kindergarten/Language Arts
           Strand: Oral Communication
           2 Topic: Listening and Speaking
           Standard: Listens to a variety of literary forms, including stories and poems.

           Grade: Kindergarten/Health
           Strand: Family Living
           5 Topic: Roles
           Standard: Discusses different ways children can contribute to and benefit from their families.
Website: http://www.avma.org/careforanimals/kidscorner/default.asp
Description of Activity: Books are a wonderful way for children to learn objectives. A good book that would be appropriate for children K-2 is "Authur's Pet Business" By: Marc Brown. The teacher should also talk about the responsibilities that pets need to survive like: water, food, shelter, air, veterinarian care, and exercise. The teacher should also talk about how the family can divide the responsibilities of caring for a pet. Begin the activity be reading this book to the children. I created an activity worksheet and got the idea from the website above. The activity is a worksheet that has things on it that pets need and things pets do not need. The children will recognize pet's needs and circle the things that are needed to care for pets properly. Click here to view or print out the activity worksheet. A cute craft for young children is making pet puppets out of lunch sacks. Kids could draw on the puppets and have a puppet show about what pets need once they learn the proper way to care for pets.
Assessment: The worksheet activity can be assessed by seeing if the children circled the correct images.

Activity for 3-4:
Title: Pet Care Riddle Book
Grade: 3-5
Subject: Life Science and Language Arts
QCC's: Grade: Third Grade/Language Arts
             Strand: Written Communication
             21 Topic: Reading
             Standard: Demonstrates an understanding of semantic relationships by using context clues, word
             meanings, and prior knowledge in reading.

            Grade: Third Grade/Science
            Strand: Life Science
            12 Topic: The Living World: Living Things
          Standard: Recognizes and describes basic life processes. Identifies evidence of basic life processes
            in the immediate environment such as gathering and digesting food, excreting waste products,
            reproducing, breathing and responding to the environment.
Website: http://www.first-school.ws/activities/occasions/petcare.htm
Description of Activity: Click on the website above to view the Pet Care Riddle Book. The book is a book for children that tells children how to care for pets in the riddle and the children have to figure out what kind of pet the riddle is talking about. To print out the book, go the the website and click on the three links under the materials column.
Assessment: The activity can be assessed by seeing if the child answered the riddles correctly and understand how to care for pets.



Software Review

Title of software program: Jump Start Learning System: Preschool
Published by: Knowledge Adventure, Inc.
What is the purpose of this software?  Briefly describe how the program works.  This program helps preschool age children develop skills in many different areas, such as: Comprehension, phonics and letter sounds, computer mouse skills, letters, numbers, vocabulary, and music.
Evaluate the software.  What problems did you have using the software? Is it user-friendly? The software was very user friendly and appropriate for 2-4 year olds. It was interactive and would be lots of fun and learning for children.

Title of software program: Winnie the Pooh: Preschool
Published by: Disney Interactive
What is the purpose of this software?  Briefly describe how the program works. This software helps preschoolers gain an early understanding of letters, numbers, sequencing, phonics, and color theory with games.
Evaluate the software.  What problems did you have using the software? Is it user-friendly? The program was very animated as it goes through a story line about Winnie the Pooh. The children can play many games to help Winnie the Pooh through his adventures.


Title of software program: Ready for Preschool
Published by: Fisher-Price, Inc.
What is the purpose of this software?  Briefly describe how the program works. This software has three levels of difficulty so children can increase the level of difficulty based on their mastery of skills. The skills that are tested are: listening, memory, shapes, matching, sequencing counting, letters, responsibility, sorting and size, music, rhythm, and creative expression.
Evaluate the software.  What problems did you have using the software? Is it user-friendly? This program was easy to operate and it is my mentor teacher's favorite. The kids seem to enjoy it to because it is easy and age appropriate.