Animals are a common special interest in my classroom so I have taken full advantage over the years of using animals to teach a variety of skills. One of my favorite units to dive into with my students is all about animals—especially animal habitats and how animals survive in the wild. It’s an engaging topic that naturally sparks curiosity and is perfect for hands-on learning. Over the years, I’ve found some creative strategies that really help make this concept click for the students in my special education classroom. In this post, I’m sharing my go-to tips and activities for teaching about animals in special education settings:
For my TPT store, I divided all of my animal activities into thematic units by narrowing down the topic including:
We had so much fun exploring books and videos about different animal habitats! I also incorporated learning about living and non-living animals.
🦉 Vocabulary Word and Picture Cards
🐮 Visual Recipes for Crunchy Birds Nests and Sea Turtle Snacks
🐈 Weekend Reports for home communication (2)
🐻 Reading Communication Board for Pond Circle, We're Going on a Bear Hunt, and Welcome Home, Bear
🐍 Living vs. Non-Living Sort
🦆 Pet Habitats Base 10 Task Cards
🐧 Habitat Sorting Activity
I admit that some of the higher-level biology standards like animal habitats, food chains, and animal traits were a bit tricky for me to teach in my elementary self-contained special education classroom. It was important to me to address these standards while also making the content accessible to my students.
🪶 Vocabulary Word and Picture Cards
🪶 Visual Recipes for Animal Mix
🪶 Weekend Reports for home communication (2)
🪶 Reading Communication Board for I'm Going to Eat You and Who Am I?
🪶 Skip Counting by 10s Sequencing
🪶 Comparing Sets Cut and Paste Worksheet
The zoo theme is definitely a favorite for my students!
🦁 Vocabulary Word and Picture Cards
🦁 Visual Recipes for Lion Crackers and Animal Face Pizzas🦁 Weekend Reports for home communication (2)
🦁 Reading Communication Board for Dear Zoo and The View at the Zoo
🦁 Zoo Cage Animal Cookie Counting Task Cards
🦁 Comparing Sets Cut and Paste Worksheet
🦁 Dear Zoo Class Book Writing Activity
We have several farms in our region so it was always fun to plan a farm field trip as a culminating activity for this fun thematic unit!
🐮 Vocabulary Word and Picture Cards
🐮 Visual Recipes for Pigs in a Blanket and Haystacks
🐮 Weekend Reports for home communication (2)
🐮 Reading Communication Board for The Big Red Barn and Mrs. Wishy Washy's Farm
🐮 Piggy Bank Coin Counting
🐮 Farm Following Directions Cut and Paste Activity
This is another favorite unit for my students. We love watching live feeds at the
National Aquarium and even watching Finding Nemo!
🦀 Vocabulary Word and Picture Cards
🦀 Visual Recipes for Tortilla Crab Sandwich, Peanut Butter Banana Fish Toast, Sand Dollar Cookies
🦀 Weekend Reports for home communication (2)
🦀 Reading Communication Board for Way Down Deep on the Deep Blue Sea
🦀 Goldfish Cracker Counting Task Cards
🦀 Ocean Counting Worksheet
🦀 Fill-in-the-Blank Ocean Writing
Forest AnimalsOne of the most relatable habitats for my students was the forest because we have the metroparks and several wooded areas close to our school. Students loved going into the forest to look for the thematic vocabulary... especially the animals!
🐻 Vocabulary Word and Picture Cards
🐻 Visual Recipes for Pine Cone Bird Feeders and Brown Bear French Toast
🐻 Weekend Reports for home communication (2)
🐻 Reading Communication Board for Bear Wants More and Baby Bear, Baby Bear, What Do You See?
🐻 Bear Wants More Sequencing
🐻 Bear Wants More True vs. False Game
🐻 Base 10 Forest Animal Habitat Matching Task Cards
🐻 Hiding Foxes Subtraction Worksheet
Across these thematic units, I have created over 70 different activities for reading, math, cooking, science, communication, games, writing, and more! Here are some of the common features you can find across all of my thematic units:
Every single activity has a corresponding lesson plan with ideas for implementing the activity for different group sizes and differentiation tips for accommodating or extending each lesson.
Also included in each unit there are reading communication boards for popular picture books (12 books total across all 6 units), but I decided to dive deeper into two of my favorites, Dear Zoo and Bear Wants More and created comprehensive Picture Book Communication and Comprehension resources which have picture-supported supports, progress monitoring, and IEP goals for a variety of elementary communication and comprehension skills!
Just like my thematic units, every single activity in my picture book units has a corresponding lesson plan with ideas for implementing the activity for different group sizes and differentiation tips for accommodating or extending each lesson.
I also included IEP goal ideas that can be used across picture book units and are easily monitored with the included progress monitoring data sheets.
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I hope these resources help you in your classroom as much as they helped me in mine!
