Flannel Friday-Color Zoo

I have always loved Color Zoo by Lois Ehlert, but it is a hard one to share in a group environment like story time.  I thought that it would be a good selection for our Play to Learn early literacy program, though, because it promotes a one-on-one environment.  With this program I like to put out flannelboards for the kids to play with so flannelizing Color Zoo required some thinking.  

I started off by making another pizza box flannelboard (if you missed the previous saga, I now have about 42 empty pizza boxes sitting my desk awaiting inspiration).  After playing with the flannel set one time through, I think that I am going to divide the book into three separate flannelboard sets or pizza boxes.  There are just too many pieces in one set unless I want the kids to play with it all day long.  

For the flannel pieces, my inspiration was a combo of Mr. Potato Head and tangrams.  If you look through Color Zoo, you will see that it is a combination of shapes and colors (which make great flannelboard patterns).  You can also make a pattern for some of the shapes by tracing through the die cut.  Instead of gluing the animals together, I cut out their individual shapes.  This way the kids can make the animals with a pattern or use their imagination and make their own creations.

This is what the final stack of pieces looks like.  You can see why 

I would like three separate boxes for them.

Are you ready for some fun?  We are going to play guess the animals!  Answers will follow.

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Answers:  1. tiger  2. mouse  3. fox  4. ox  5. monkey  6. deer  7. lion  8. goat  9. snake

This week's Flannel Friday round-up is hosted by Mollie at What Happens in Storytime...  If you are celebrating this weekend, Happy Easter.  If you are like Michigan where all of the kiddos are on Spring Break, may the force be with you!