Teaching science in elementary school is crucial for nurturing young minds, but as educators, finding the time and resources to create engaging lessons can be a challenge. That's where this podcast comes in. Welcome to Naturally Teaching Elementary Science, the show dedicated to supporting elementary teachers in their quest to bring authentic and place-based science experiences to their classroom.

I'm Victoria Zablocki, a Certified Elementary Teacher turned Outdoor Educator. With over a decade of experience coaching teachers on effective science teaching methods, I'm passionate about making science accessible, understandable, and fun for educators and students alike. Join me as we explore strategies for teaching science in elementary school with practical teaching tips, insightful interviews, picture book reviews, and more.

Whether you've taught for a long time or just started your teaching journey, this podcast is your trusty resource for enhancing your science curriculum. So let's grow together.

All right, everybody, welcome back to the Naturally Teaching Elementary Science podcast. My name is Victoria Zablocki, and I'm your host. So last week in episode 29, we talked about teaching some of your science standards by exploring hibernation in animals.

So in the episode, I described hibernation as well as other forms of dormancy, including torpor, brumation and diapause, because hibernation is not the only way that animals sleep. I then shared six different activities paired with Next Generation Science Standards for grades K-5, including a movement cube walk where first graders act out ways animals prepare for their winter sleep, a chipmunk relay race where second graders gather seeds with their “cheek pouches”, a model creation activity for third graders to develop a representation of an insect surviving winter in one of its different life stages and three other activities. If you haven't had a chance to listen, make sure to go back and check out episode 29 for more deets.

I'll make sure to include a link in the show notes too if you want to check it out. So this week I wanted to continue the conversation, but focus on picture books to help you investigate the concept of animal dormancy either as an introduction or as a continuation of your study. If you've listened to my other episodes about picture books, I'm sure that you've caught on to the fact that I'm very passionate about teaching science concepts with the help of children's literature.

And for good reason. Research has shown that integrating science and literacy has many benefits, including saving teachers time in their schedule, improved attitudes of children towards science, better overall performance in reading and science, and so many more. For more info about benefits and methods for integrating science and literacy, check out my blog post “Teaching with Books: How to Integrate Science and Literacy for Elementary Classrooms”, which I'll also make sure there's a link in the show notes for that.

[2:54]

All right, so let's get into these books. So book number one is Hibernation Station by Michelle Meadows. This book would be a good introduction to sleeping through the winter for children who have never heard of such a thing.

Meadows uses rhythm and rhyme to share different kinds of animals that sleep through the winter in fantastical ways, including wearing pajamas and slippers, using pillows and blankets, eating snacks, using hibernation maps, singing lullabies, and riding on a train. Some of the sleeping animals that are included are raccoons, mice, snails, squirrels, snakes, bears, skunks, frogs, turtles, hedgehogs, bats, salamanders, groundhogs, and chipmunks. So by using human bedtime routines, it makes it easier for early childhood learners to relate to.

So it may come as a shock to young students that animals can actually sleep all winter long. And this is a nice way to ease into that concept. However, the author chooses to use hibernation to describe the sleep that all the animals are experiencing.

But remember, if you've listened to episode 29 of this podcast, you now know that there are other words to describe the different kinds of sleep that animals do. And you could use the word dormancy to describe all of them as a blanket term if you would prefer.

[4:08]

Book number two is Snuggle Down Deep by Diane Ohanesian. And Ohanesian shares animals that sleep during the winter with rhythm, rhyme and repeated verse. She gives two sentences of unique information about each animal. Then she repeats her sleeping verse, tying them all back together.

So animals that are introduced in this story include bears, squirrels, mice, turtles, deer, frogs, rabbits, chipmunks, skunks and raccoons. And the illustrations in this book gives students a great visual as to the many different ways that animals can sleep through the winter. I appreciate the diversity of animal groups represented.

She uses mammals, reptiles and amphibians. And if you choose to use this book to introduce sleeping during the winter, I just want you to keep in mind that this book is not exclusively about animal dormancy. Some of the animals shown in the book sleep all winter while others are active during the winter.

So the ones that go dormant in winter are the bears, turtles, frogs, skunks and raccoons. And then squirrels will sleep in their nest during the night, and then they find food during the day. Mice will sleep during the day and then use the subnivean layer to move around at night.

Deer are active during dawn and dusk and will sleep under trees to keep out of the wind. And rabbits are also active during dawn and dusk and will sleep under shrubs to stay out of the weather. So those last few are actually active during the winter time, but will sleep during a normal schedule like they do the rest of the year.

[5:34]

Book number three is Time to Sleep by Denise Fleming. And this simple storyline is about animals reading the changes in the seasons as clues that it's time to go to sleep. So some of the seasonal signs that the animals notice are frost on the grass, the leaves on the trees changing colors, the leaves falling from the trees, and the geese flying south.

Each animal shares the news with another animal to encourage them to go to sleep. And the animals that are featured in this story are bear, snail, skunk, turtle, woodchuck, and ladybug. And this is a nice simple introduction to the idea of animals sleeping through the winter.

It's perfect for early childhood readers. It shares examples of a variety of different animals and where they might sleep. And if you're looking for a book about sleeping animals only, this is a great option.

Fleming doesn't use the word hibernation, so you could also choose to introduce the different words of dormancy without contradicting the author. She simply states that it's time to go to sleep, so that would make it easy for you to introduce some of this new vocabulary to your students.

Book number four is Over and Under the Snow by Kate Messner. Messner shares a variety of winter animal adaptations in this comparison story. The main character is skiing with her dad through the woods and notices animals above the snow and how they're interacting with the winter scenery. As they ski, the dad shares his knowledge of the Subnivean layer, a secret kingdom below the snow that animals use to survive winter.

Some of the animals and adaptations shared in the story line include owls hunting through the winter, voles and shrews using tunnels in the snow to escape predators, deer mice sleeping under the snow, snowshoe hares changing from brown to white, bullfrogs sleeping in the mud, beavers spending time in their den under the snow, foxes pouncing on animals moving under the snow, chipmunks waking up to eat in their burrows and more. And this book is a great introduction to a variety of adaptations to help animals survive the winter. Messner does a great job sharing these adaptations in simple ways for children to be able to relate to and to understand.

Plus, the illustrations by Christopher Silas Neal carry a lot of significance and understanding of animal adaptations. They give their reader an x-ray view into the ground and snow layer to understand what these animals are doing. This is one of my all-time favorite books about animals in winter.

If you like the sounds of this book, check out my “Over and Under the Snow Picture Book Companion for Third Grade” on Teachers Pay Teachers. It includes activities such as answering key questions about the text, sharing how pictures help tell the story, a short research project about an animal from the book, designing a winter habitat for their animal, building a model of their habitat, observing winter animals in your schoolyard, winter weather data collection, and graphing the winter weather data. I'll make sure to put a link for that in the show notes if you're interested in checking it out.

[8:22]

Book number five is Winter Sleep by Sean Taylor and Alex Morss. In this book, a child and their grandma Sylvie spend time together over the summer, and the child remembers a hidden glade that they visited. It was full of flowers, butterflies, and lots of life.

When the child revisits their grandma again in the winter, they visit the glade, and it's completely different. It's covered in snow, and all of the animals seem to be missing. This leads to the child asking grandma Sylvie about the animals, and they talk about hibernation and sleeping through the winter as they hike through the woods.

Animals described as sleeping through the winter in this story include dormouse, bats, stag beetles, queen bumblebees, moth and butterfly pupa, earwigs, frogs, and bears. This is a great introduction to animal dormancy as many different kinds of animals are introduced. The information is brought up organically and from the perspective of a curious child, which then gives your students permission to wonder about nature and ask questions, just like the main character.

And I love this book for its content, storyline, inquisitiveness, and illustrations. It's a great choice if you're introducing dormancy to students of any age. My only qualm is that they use the term hibernation for each animal when we know that dormancy is a more appropriate blanket term. Aside from that, wonderful, wonderful, wonderful book.

[9:37]

Book number six is Chipmunk at Hollow Tree Lane by Victoria Sharrow. And this book is about a chipmunk in November that recognizes that winter is on the way and she needs to prepare for her long sleep ahead.

So she gathers seeds and acorns and puts them in her burrow and scares off another chipmunk that finds the acorns she's been gathering and putting in her cheek pouches. She then climbs into her burrow and goes to sleep for the winter. This is a recent find for me, and even though it's from 1994, it is a gem in my eyes.

The perfect book to introduce chipmunks and their experience getting ready for winter. If you listen to episode 29 and you're considering using the chipmunk relay race I described for second grade, this would be a great book to start with before giving your students a run at the relay race. It has lovely illustrations and a great storyline to depict what an animal goes through to get ready for their torpor.

[10:27]

Book number seven is I Don't Want to Go to Sleep by Dev Petty. And this is a silly book about a frog that doesn't want to go to sleep for the winter. The reader gets to listen in to a frog's conversation with an owl as the frog explains that it can't wait for winter because it wants to play in the snow like pig.

But the owl keeps poo-pooing the idea, telling the frog that it has to sleep because frogs hibernate. Frog wants to drink warm drinks, ice skate, play in the snow, curl up by the fire and sleep in a fluffy blanket. Owl tells the frog that they're supposed to be sinking to the bottom of the pond and covering themselves in mud to sleep.

A compromise between the two at the end of the book will make your students laugh for sure. And this is a goofy book and could be paired with an informational text or a narrative informational text to help provide scientific information alongside the silly storyline.

It will definitely grab your students' attention and probably inspire a lot of interesting questions. So consider this for an introduction to your unit and let your students lead the study with their inquisitiveness.

[11:26]

Book number eight is A Salamander's Life by John Himmelman. And this book is about the yearly cycle of a salamander's life.

Himmelman shares the birth of this salamander as she exits her egg, grows in the pond and then makes her way to the forest. She avoids predation a few times and lives amongst the leaves on the forest floor. When winter comes, she finds a burrow to sleep in under the frost line.

And when the spring comes, she emerges to find a pond to lay her eggs in. As the story goes on, the cycle continues with her hunting in the summer and fall, sleeping through the winter, and laying eggs in the spring. This is a good introduction to an amphibian that sleeps through the winter.

Even though this book isn't solely focused on the sleeping aspect, it's a nice perspective for your students to see that the animal is busy in the spring, summer, and fall, that she eats mainly invertebrates, something that can't be found in the winter, and how she prepares for her sleep. It would pair nicely with Time to Sleep, since Fleming doesn't have an amphibian in her storyline.

[12:21]

Book number nine is Not a Buzz to Be Found by Linda Glaser. And this book is all about insects and how they sleep through the winter. If you listened to episode 29, then you'll recall that I described this book for the third grade activity of creating models of insect life stages in winter. In the book, Glaser shares insects surviving winter by migrating or sleeping in various life stages.

She shares insects that lay eggs to perpetuate their species, including praying mantises and field crickets. Some of the insects survive in the winter in their larval or nymph stages, such as the woolly bear caterpillar, the gallfly, and the common pond hawk dragonfly. Glaser also mentions the black swallowtail butterfly as an example of an insect that survives the winter in their pupa stage.

And there are multiple insects in the book that survive winter as adults, including ladybird beetles, aka ladybugs, mourning cloak butterflies, ants, and bald-faced hornet queens. This is by far one of my favorite books about insects ever, and can be a great introduction to the fact that not all insects in all life stages live through the winter. The illustrations by Jamie Zollars are also invaluable with depicting where the insects are and how they're sleeping through the winter. Another oldie, but also another goodie.

[13:31]

Book number 10 is Summertime Sleepers by Melissa Stewart. And even though we're talking about sleeping through the winter, I had to include this book as a comparison to hibernation.

I didn't talk about this in episode 29, but there's actually another form of dormancy called estivation. Estivation is when an animal sleeps through the summer. Just like winter, summer is a time of extremes, this time extreme heat and dryness.

To help some animals survive, they enter a form of dormancy where they use less energy during a time, it's difficult to find what they need. Some of the animals that Stewart features in this book about estivation are ladybugs, mourning cloak butterflies, land snails, African lungfish, California tiger salamander, spotted turtles, desert hedgehogs, and more. So even though many of us are not in school during the time that animals would be entering estivation, it's still a cool idea that animals sleep through the summer like they do in the winter. It could be a fun Friday idea to read about and compare estivating animals to hibernating animals.

[14:32]

So in a nutshell, we talked about 10 books on hibernation and other forms of dormancy. Titles that we talked about include, Hibernation Station by Michelle Meadows, Snuggle Down Deep by Diane Ohanesian, Time to Sleep by Denise Fleming, Over and Under the Snow by Kate Messner, Winter Sleep by Sean Taylor and Alex Morse, Chipmunk at Hollow Tree Lane by Victoria Sherrow, I Don't Want to Go to Sleep by Dev Petty, A Salamander's Life by John Himmelman, Not a Buzz to Be Found by Linda Glaser, and Summertime Sleepers by Melissa Stewart.

And don't forget, if you're looking for science and ELA activities to go along with Over and Under the Snow, check out my picture book companion “Over and Under the Snow Book Companion for Third Grade” in my Teachers Pay Teachers Store. So thanks for taking time to listen today. I know you're busy and I truly appreciate the time you take to tune in.

If you have any questions, wonderings, or books on hibernation and other forms of dormancy that you like to read, get ahold of me on Instagram at Naturally.Teaching, or you can email me at victoria@naturallyteaching.com. And don't forget to check out the show notes for this episode at naturallyteaching.com/episode30, where I'll have the links to that picture book companion and all of the books that I've mentioned. So thanks again for joining me today, and until next time, keep exploring, keep learning, and keep naturally teaching.

Thank you so much for tuning in to today's episode of the Naturally Teaching Elementary Science podcast. I hope you found it informative, inspiring, and full of actionable insights to enhance your science teaching journey. Connect with me on social media for more updates, science tidbits, and additional resources.

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