Welcome to TechKNOW Associates' The Perfect Animal page. This project was developed through a partnership between TechKNOW Associates and Compass Learning. To download a copy of the project, you will need a userid and password. Please go to the Terms of Use page for more information.

TechKNOW Associates Corporation can provide expert, onsite staff development to insure that teachers and children fully implement this and other projects at a reasonable cost. We will train teachers in the classroom with their students, model lessons, and help them integrate technology into their curriculum through a project-based approach.

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Over the next few weeks, your first, second and third grade students will become zookeepers at a new children’s zoo. As they research and categorize animals for the zoo, they will determine which animal is The Perfect Animal for the zoo. Your students will work in small cooperative groups to become authorities on one or more animals. Through the use of CompassLearning Odyssey, books, magazines and the Internet, your young zookeepers will research categories of animals as they develop critical literacy, math, and science strategies. They will break new ground by using the computer as an educational tool to plan and present their "Animal Award" at the conclusion of the project.

The Perfect Animal project is designed to develop and build a foundation of strong reading and communication skills. It provides a variety of reading experiences in various content areas while addressing performance standards in English Language Arts, Science, and Mathematics. The project provides a vehicle for early childhood teachers to introduce young students to the concept of research and related strategies in the context of a real-world activity. Finally, this project provides your students with a genuine opportunity to present information and ideas in front of an audience in a meaningful and exciting fashion. The project is divided into two interrelated learning phases followed by a culminating activity:

Phase One – Zookeepers at Work: Students will explore the animal world in order to understand and describe the animal’s physical characteristics, what it eats, how it moves, breathes and reproduces. By incorporating technology, our young zookeepers will conduct research, classify data, and communicate their information. Students will design and prepare an informative animal picture book for each of the animal studied. They will determine which animals should be selected for the children’s zoo.

Phase Two – Animals and Their Environment: Students will study animals in their habitats. They will explore in depth how animals interact with their environment, how they survive, how they adapt, and possible threats to their existence. Students will create multimedia presentations and dioramas to illustrate and represent the results of their research.

Culminating Activity – The Perfect Zoo: Armed with information about a variety of animals, each cooperative group will select the one animal that they feel would be the perfect animal for their zoo. Students will participate in a culminating activity that will provide them with a genuine opportunity to present their choices through original books, dioramas, artwork, pictures, and books.

To download a copy of this project, you will need a userid and password. Please go to the Terms of Use page for more information. If you have a userid and password, click here.