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WINDOW
BATS
Invite your children to try one or both of these art activities.
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Use cardboard to make several bat templates. Let the
children use white chalk or crayons to trace around the
templates on black paper. Help them cut out the bat shapes.
Then tape the shapes onto your room windows to create
a fun October scene. |
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Have the children rubber-stamp black bat
prints onto windows or sliding glass doors. (The ink will
come off easily with glass cleaner.) |
BAT
MURAL
Cut a giant full moon shape out of yellow paper. Attach
the moon shape to a dark blue background on a wall at
your children’s eye level. Invite the children to trace
around bat cookie cutters on black paper and cut out the
shapes. Let them add details to their bats using glitter-glue
pens, if desired. Then help them glue or tape their bats
onto the yellow moon to create a night sky scene. |
BAT COUNTS
Explain
to your children that bats like to make themselves
small and hide in nooks and crannies in dark places,
such as caves, attics, and tall trees. Let the
children use crayons or markers to draw outdoor
scenes on pieces of construction paper Then have
them draw tiny black ovals to represent bats hiding
in various places in their pictures. When they
have finished, help them to count the numbers
of their bats and write the corresponding numerals
on their papers. |
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BAT
OPPOSITES
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Large and Small: Talk with your children about
how some kinds of bats are large, with wing spans
measuring 6 feet, while other kinds of bats are
small, with wing spans of only 6½ inches.
Then place a number of large and small objects on
a table and have the children divide them by size
into two groups. |
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Upside Down and Right Side Up: Use picture books
to show how bats roost upside down. Then divide
a large paper into two columns titled “Upside Down”
and “Right Side Up. Give the children cutouts of
people, animals, autos, lamps, and so on. Let them
arrange half of the pictures upside down in the
first column and the other half of the pictures
right side up in the second column. If you wish,
have them glue the pictures in place to make an
Upside Down-Right Side Up wall chart. |
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BAT MOVES
For
each of your children, cut a bat wings shape, about
8 inches by 2 inches, out of black paper. Tape one end
of a piece of thread, about 6 inches long, to the middle
of the bat wings shape. Tie the other end of the thread
to the end of a drinking straw and secure with tape.
Put on some music. Then have the children hold onto
their straws and gently wave their bats back and forth
to make them “fly.” |
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MORE
BAT FUN
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Display picture books about various kinds
of bats and discuss their characteristics and habits. |
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Read the book “Stellaluna” by Janell Cannon to your
children. |
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Together, make a “bat cave.” Cover a table with a blanket
for the cave and tape paper bat shapes hanging upside
down from the underside of the tabletop. |
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DEEP IN THE BAT CAVE
Tune: “Down by the Station”
Deep in the bat cave
Early in the evening,
See the little black bats
Hanging in a row.
Now it’s growing darker,
Time to leave the bat cave.
Zip! Zip! Zip! Zip!
Out they go.
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BAT
SNACKTIME
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Some varieties of bats eat fruit and sip nectar from flowers.
Set out several kinds of sliced fruit and let your children
choose those they want for snacking. Also provide cups of juice
for “nectar.” |
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Have your children rubber-stamp bat prints onto construction
paper to make snacktime placemats. |
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