Select five pictures of nocturnal animals, such as owls, opossum, bats, cats and bush babies. Prepare some information on each. Fold a piece of printer paper in half lengthwise, open it up and fold it widthwise. Draw a line along these folds lines with a pencil. Draw a circle where the two lines meet, large enough to draw a picture in while leaving room near the four corners for other pictures. Erase the lines in the circle.
Photocopy the piece of paper until there is one piece for every student plus several extras. Pass out one of these pieces of paper to every student in the class. Tell the class to get out crayons. Tell them that they are going to draw five animals on this piece of paper, one in each section. Hold up a picture, talk about the nocturnal animal depicted in it and have them draw a rendition of the animal on part of the paper. Keep the picture on display for reference. Once it appears that everyone is done with one animal, move on to the next one.
Make a list on the chalkboard of nocturnal animals. Set up a mural of a nighttime scene on a wall using wall tack and paper cutouts, including a moon and stars, trees, hills, an open barn and a streetlight. Have each student pick an animal from the selection on the chalkboard that they want a cutout of to color. Make a cutout for each student in accordance with what he or she chose. Let the students color their cutouts. When a student is done with his or her cutout, apply wall tack to it and help the student place it in an appropriate place on the paper cutout mural, such as a bat near a streetlight.
Write a selection of nocturnal animals on the chalkboard. Ask each student what they kind of nocturnal animal they want to have out of this selection. Draw a mask for each of these animals. Make a copy of each mask in accordance with the students’ choices. Copy extras in case of accidents. Have the students cut out their masks, or do it yourself. Punch holes on the sides of the mask. Have the students form a line to have the strings tied onto their masks at the holes for holding the mask in place.
Obtain some air-dry clay. Have the students shape the nocturnal animal of their choice. Set them aside to dry, and have the students draw a habitat for their animals on a piece of paper. Glue each piece of paper to a piece of cardboard, with the name of the student on the underside of the cardboard. Set each student’s model on the habitat he or she made.