A guide for using our resources

Children will identify the defenses and other characteristics of hedgehogs.

Vocabulary: forage, hibernate, wild

Science Focus: animal defenses

Simple, spectacular ideas to boost your lessons.

• In this heartwarming story, both Hedgehog and Turtle are looking for hugs. What will happen when they meet each other?

• Play a hedgehog counting game with this cute craft. Have children create a hedgehog in pairs. First, have them shape a piece of brown or neutral play dough to look like a hedgehog’s body. They can add googly eyes to show where its face is. Give the pair a supply of brown or black pipe cleaners cut into short pieces.
• Next, have partners take turns rolling a number cube and pushing that many pipe cleaner “quills” into their hedgehog. The game ends when all the quills have been added.

• Use pages 2-3 of the issue to do this scavenger hunt as a group.

1. Find the heading. Underline it.

2. Find the picture of a hoglet. Put a ✔ on it.

3. In the purple box, find the word that means look for food. Circle them.

4. Look at the bottom bar. Which hedgehog is hibernating?

Skill: art, writing

Materials: paper plates, markers or crayons, scissors

• Cut paper plates in half so that each child gets half a plate. With the straight edge facing down, have children cut a curve (like a small semicircle) out of the right end.
• Next, have children color the hedgehog and draw its nose, eye, mouth, and ear.
• Have children cut along the lines of the paper plate’s ridges to make the quills.
• On the back of the plate, have kids write one fact they learned about hedgehogs.