Then and Now: Exploring the Past with Young Learners

What would life have been like before smartphones, electric lights, and the cars we see today? During my travels, I have visited homes associated with Ulysses S. Grant, Abraham Lincoln, and Bill Clinton. Photos from these visits, along with pictures of an old cable car and a driverless car, offer wonderful starting points for exploring change. For young learners, noticing familiar things in unfamiliar forms can turn history into a conversation filled with curiosity!

My Then and Now Fact Booklet helps children compare life in the past with life today through simple nonfiction text, note-taking, research pages, and crafts. A take-home copy also invites families to share their own memories. 

To extend the learning, my How to Draw Then and Now pairs guided drawings with three levels of writing. From log cabins and modern houses to candles and lamps, students can draw, write, and discover how people meet similar needs in different ways.

Here are five Read-Alouds to explore Then and Now:

The Little House by Virginia Lee Burton — Follow the changes around a little house as its quiet countryside becomes a busy city. A lovely starting point for discussing how communities change.

When I Was Young in the Mountains by Cynthia Rylant — Childhood memories invite children to compare family routines and everyday experiences with their own lives.

Home Then and Now by Robin Nelson — Photographs and simple text introduce changes in lighting, food storage, and life at home.

School Then and Now by Robin Nelson — Explore classrooms, school supplies, and transportation from the past and present. Children will have plenty to compare with their own school!

Communication Then and Now by Robin Nelson — Discover how sharing messages has changed, and talk about the ways children communicate today.

Five Simple Classroom Activities

-Photo Detectives: Display historical and present-day photographs. Ask students to notice details and share what looks different or familiar.

-Then and Now Picture Sort: Sort pictures of homes, transportation, and everyday objects into groups. Include a “both” space for things people still use today!

-Ask an Older Relative or Friend: Invite children to ask a trusted adult about a childhood toy, school experience, or way of traveling. Share their discoveries through drawings or sentences.

-Draw and Compare: Draw a pair of related objects, such as a candle and a lamp. Discuss how they serve a similar purpose and write one comparison.

-Build a Class Museum: Display drawings, photographs, or safe everyday objects with simple labels explaining how people used them then and use them now.

Learning about then and now helps children see history in the places, objects, and stories around them. Although homes, transportation, and technology change, people continue to need shelter, connection, and ways to get from place to place. With photographs, books, drawing, and family conversations, even our youngest learners can begin making meaningful connections between the past and their own lives. What photograph or everyday object would you share to spark a “Then and Now” conversation? 

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Celebrating German Unity Day with Young Learners

October is often filled with pumpkins, colorful leaves, and Halloween activities, but it is also a wonderful month to help children explore another country and culture. On October 3, Germany celebrates German Unity Day. This national holiday remembers the reunification of East and West Germany in 1990 after decades of separation.

Although the Berlin Wall opened in November 1989, Germany’s official reunification took place the following year. October 3 then became the country’s national holiday. German Unity Day provides a meaningful opportunity to introduce children to the idea that people may have different experiences and histories, but hope, cooperation, and unity can bring communities together. 

Germany is much more than another destination in my passport journey. It was my home for nearly 30 years, and it continues to hold a special place in my heart. The places I visited, the people I met, the celebrations I attended, and the everyday scenes I experienced gave me memories that I still treasure today.  One of my most meaningful photographs shows me chipping a small piece of rock from the Berlin Wall. The wall once divided the city of Berlin and separated families, friends, and communities. Holding a piece of it made history feel real and personal. It was no longer simply something I had read about in a book. I was standing beside a symbol of division during a remarkable period of change.

Young children do not need to understand every complicated detail of Germany’s history. We can explain it in simple terms: Germany was divided into two parts for many years. A wall separated part of Berlin, and people could not move freely from one side to the other. Eventually, the wall opened, and the two parts of Germany became one country again.

Resources for Taking Your Class to Germany

You do not need airline tickets to take your students on an unforgettable trip to Germany! Books, photographs, drawing activities, and cultural centers can turn the classroom into an exciting international destination.

Germany Fact Booklet

The Germany Fact Booklet introduces young learners to the country through simple, age-appropriate information. Students can learn about Germany’s location, flag, language, landmarks, foods, traditions, and other interesting features.

The booklet can be used during guided reading, independent reading, a geography lesson, or an around-the-world study. It also gives children a helpful source of information when they are completing a country report or creating a travel journal.

How to Draw Germany

The How to Draw Germany resource allows children to respond creatively to what they are learning. Step-by-step drawings make important German symbols and cultural objects accessible to young artists.

After completing a drawing, students can add labels, write a sentence, or share one fact connected to their picture. The differentiated writing pages allow children at different levels to participate successfully. These activities work well in an art center, writing center, cultural center, or early-finisher station.

Cultural Centers and Activities—Germany

The Cultural Centers and Activities—Germany resource turns a country study into a hands-on classroom adventure.

Students can decorate a luggage case with stamps, stickers, maps, and pictures from Germany. They can examine country photographs, read an informational fact sheet, create a stamp, design a German shirt, complete crafts, participate in Write the Room and Count the Room activities, sort sentences, and design a postcard.

A generic passport is also included, making the resource especially useful for a cultural fair or a larger around-the-world unit. Children can receive a stamp after completing each center or use their passports to record the countries they have explored.

These activities combine geography and culture with literacy, math, art, and imaginative play. Instead of simply memorizing facts, children become active travelers and explorers.

Five Books to Share with Young Learners

Books help children see a country through its landscapes, traditions, stories, and people. Availability and reading levels may vary, so teachers may want to preview each title for their particular class.

Kids' Travel Guide - Germany: The fun way to discover Germany - expecially for kids by Shiela Leon and Salome G:  Childen will explore German culture, food, and customs and even lean a few handy words in German!

This Is Munich by Miroslav Šašek: The colorful illustrations take readers through Munich’s streets, buildings, landmarks, and traditions. It pairs especially well with a discussion of Oktoberfest and German architecture.

Germany ABCs: A Book About the People and Places of Germany by Sarah Heiman:

Organized around the alphabet, this informational book introduces German places, people, customs, and symbols. Teachers can select individual pages to share with younger students rather than reading the entire book at once.

Hansel and Gretel by the Brothers Grimm: Choose a beautifully illustrated, age-appropriate edition of this traditional German tale. It can open a discussion about folktales, forests, story settings, and how stories are passed from one generation to another.

The Bremen Town Musicians by the Brothers Grimm: This folktale follows four animals traveling toward the German city of Bremen. Its animal characters, repeated events, and theme of cooperation make it an engaging read-aloud for primary students.

Five Germany-Inspired Classroom Activities

1. Create a Classroom Passport Journey

Give each child a passport and set up several Germany stations around the room. Students might visit a map station, landmark station, reading station, drawing station, and photograph station. Add a stamp to their passports after they complete each stop.

2. Design a German Postcard

Invite students to select a German landmark, fall landscape, festival scene, or pumpkin-farm photograph for inspiration. On the front, they can draw the scene. On the back, they can write a short message:

“Greetings from Germany! Today I saw _____.”

Younger children can dictate their sentences or complete a sentence frame.

3. Compare German Pumpkins

Display pictures from the German pumpkin farm and invite students to observe the different pumpkins. Children can sort them by color, size, shape, or texture. They can also choose two pumpkins to compare using words such as larger, smaller, round, tall, smooth, or bumpy.

Finish the activity by having each child design a new pumpkin variety and give it a creative name.

4. Build a German Landmark

Provide blocks, boxes, craft sticks, paper tubes, or recycled materials and invite students to create a German castle, the Brandenburg Gate, a half-timbered house, or another structure they have seen in a photograph.

Students can work individually or in small groups. When their structures are complete, ask them to explain what they built and identify the shapes they used.

5. Make a Unity Chain

Connect German Unity Day to a simple classroom lesson about cooperation. Give each student a paper strip and ask them to draw or write one way classmates can help one another. Join the strips to create a classroom unity chain. Explain that each link is important, just as every person is an important part of the classroom community.

A Meaningful October Adventure

A study of Germany provides so many possibilities for young learners. Children can explore history through German Unity Day, experience culture through Oktoberfest, observe nature through fall photographs, compare pumpkins from a German farm, read traditional stories, create art, and practice important math and literacy skills.

For me, sharing Germany is especially meaningful because it allows me to revisit a country that was my home for so many years. Each photograph holds a memory, whether it shows the Berlin Wall, a colorful fall landscape, a lively Oktoberfest celebration, or a field filled with unusual pumpkins.

Most importantly, these photographs and learning activities can help children understand that exploring another country is about more than locating it on a map. It is about becoming curious about its people, history, traditions, stories, and everyday life.

This October, consider putting aside the usual Halloween lesson for a little while. Pack your classroom luggage, prepare your passports, and take your young travelers on a journey to Germany. No airplane required!

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Slither, Swim, and Hop into Reptile Awareness Day

October is often associated with imaginary creatures, spooky decorations, and things that slither through the night. However, the month also provides an opportunity to replace fear with facts by introducing children to some very real and very fascinating animals.

Reptile Awareness Day is observed each year on October 21. This special day encourages people to learn about reptiles, appreciate the important roles they play in nature, and understand why reptiles and their habitats need protection.

Reptiles are frequently misunderstood. Snakes may be described as frightening, alligators are often presented only as dangerous, and sea turtles may seem distant from children’s everyday lives. Age-appropriate information helps students look beyond these impressions and begin seeing reptiles as living creatures with special body features, behaviors, habitats, and survival needs.

Reptile Awareness Day is the perfect opportunity to introduce children to snakes, sea turtles, and alligators while building science, reading, writing, art, and observation skills.

Reptiles are vertebrates, which means they have backbones. Most reptiles have dry skin covered with scales or scutes, breathe air using lungs, and depend on outside sources of heat to help regulate their body temperature.

Snakes, lizards, turtles, tortoises, crocodiles, and alligators are reptiles. Depending on the species, reptiles may live in deserts, grasslands, forests, wetlands, rivers, lakes, or oceans.

Although reptiles share certain characteristics, they do not all look or behave alike. A snake moves without legs. A sea turtle has flippers that help it swim through the ocean. An alligator has short legs, a powerful tail, and an armored body.

Snakes are among the most misunderstood reptiles. Children may initially describe all snakes as scary or dangerous, but most snakes try to avoid people. Snakes have long bodies covered with scales. They do not have legs, but they can move by using their muscles and scales together. Depending on the species, snakes may slither across the ground, climb trees, burrow underground, or swim through water.

Different snakes live in different habitats and eat different types of food. A snake might eat insects, eggs, frogs, fish, birds, rodents, or other small animals. Snakes also play an important role in food chains by serving as both predators and prey.

The Snake Fact Booklet gives young learners an age-appropriate way to explore snake characteristics, vocabulary, habitats, and behavior. It can be used during a science unit, guided reading, independent reading, or a discussion comparing reptile facts with common myths.

A snake study can inspire children to investigate movement. How can an animal climb, swim, burrow, and travel across the ground without legs? That question alone can lead to a fascinating classroom conversation.

Sea turtles are reptiles specially adapted for life in the ocean. Their streamlined shells and strong flippers help them move through the water. Although sea turtles spend most of their lives in the ocean, female sea turtles must return to land to lay their eggs.

A sea turtle’s life cycle is both fascinating and challenging. After hatching, tiny sea turtles must make their way across the sand toward the ocean. As they grow, they may travel long distances through the sea.

Sea turtles face dangers from natural predators, pollution, plastic debris, discarded fishing equipment, boats, artificial lights near beaches, and the loss of nesting habitats.

The Sea Turtle Fact Booklet introduces students to sea turtle body features, habitats, diets, life cycles, and conservation. It can also encourage conversations about how choices made by people on land can affect animals living in the ocean.

Alligators have muscular tails, short legs, powerful jaws, and armored skin. Their eyes and nostrils are positioned near the top of their heads, allowing them to see and breathe while much of their body remains underwater.

Alligators are excellent swimmers, but they can also move across land. Their long tails help propel them through the water, while their dark coloring allows them to blend into wetland habitats.

A mother alligator builds a nest for her eggs and guards the nest from danger. After the babies hatch, they may remain close to their mother for protection. Young alligators have noticeable yellow markings that help camouflage them among grasses and plants.

Alligators are an important part of wetland ecosystems. During dry periods, they may create or maintain water-filled areas sometimes called alligator holes. These spaces can hold water that is used by fish, birds, turtles, and other animals.

The Alligator Fact Booklet provides an opportunity to feature an animal that may not receive much classroom attention. Young learners can explore its body features, habitat, diet, life cycle, behavior, and importance within the wetland ecosystem.

The booklet can also begin a simple comparison between alligators and crocodiles. Students can examine photographs and notice differences in snout shape, visible teeth, coloring, and habitat without needing to memorize complicated scientific classifications

Most importantly, children should learn that alligators are wild animals. They should never be approached, touched, or fed. Watching from a safe distance protects both people and alligators.

Learning Through Reptile Fact Booklets

The Snake, Sea Turtle, and Alligator Fact Booklets provide child-friendly introductions to three very different reptiles. Although the animals share reptile characteristics, each has unique adaptations that help it survive.

Students can use the booklets to practice: Identifying main ideas and details, learning science vocabulary, answering comprehension questions, comparing animal features, locating information in nonfiction text

Writing facts, and discussing animal habitats and needs.

Because the booklets follow a familiar format, teachers can use them together as a short reptile series. Students become comfortable with the learning routine while focusing their attention on a new animal.

A class might study one animal each day or spend an entire week investigating each reptile in greater depth.

Drawing helps children become close observers. When students draw a reptile step by step, they begin noticing body shape, movement, scales, shells, tails, feet, and other important features.

The How to Draw Reptiles resource combines guided drawing with three differentiated writing levels. Students can label their reptiles, complete a sentence, record several facts, describe a habitat, or explain how people can help protect the animal.

The completed drawings and writing pages can become a classroom reptile gallery, student-created reference book, hallway display, or Reptile Awareness Day bulletin board.

Five Reptile Books to Share

These books can support learning about reptiles, habitats, life cycles, and conservation. Teachers may want to preview each selection to make sure it meets the needs and reading levels of their students.

Snakes by Gail Gibbons: Accessible information and detailed illustrations introduce children to snake bodies, movement, habitats, and behavior. This nonfiction selection pairs naturally with the Snake Fact Booklet.

One Tiny Turtle by Nicola Davies: This beautifully illustrated story follows the life of a loggerhead sea turtle. It introduces children to the turtle’s ocean journey and its eventual return to a nesting beach.

Follow the Moon Home by Philippe Cousteau and Deborah Hopkinson: A young girl helps her community protect sea turtle hatchlings from confusing artificial lights. The story shows children that even young people can take part in conservation.

The Swamp Where Gator Hides by Marianne Berkes: This cumulative story introduces the plants and animals living within a swamp ecosystem. Its repeated language makes it an engaging read-aloud and helps children understand that an alligator shares its habitat with many other living things.

Snappsy the Alligator (Did Not Ask to Be in This Book!) by Julie Falatko: This humorous picture book follows an alligator who disagrees with the narrator’s description of his activities. It provides an entertaining opportunity to discuss perspective, fact versus opinion, and how fictional alligators differ from real ones.

Five Reptile Activities:

1. Create a Reptile Comparison Chart

After studying snakes, sea turtles, and alligators, create a class chart comparing the three animals.

Students can use information from the fact booklets to complete the chart. Finish by discussing which characteristics all three animals share and which make each one unique.

2. Build a Reptile Habitat

Invite students to create a habitat for a snake, sea turtle, or alligator using paper, blocks, clay, recycled materials, or natural objects.

3. Investigate Reptile Movement

Ask children to think about how the body of each reptile is suited for movement.

Students can safely imitate the animals:

Afterward, compare the body parts each animal uses. Students can draw arrows on reptile pictures to show how each animal moves.

4. Draw and Write About a Reptile

Let students choose a reptile from the How to Draw Reptiles resource. After completing the directed drawing, they can select an appropriate writing response.

Beginning writers might label body parts or complete a sentence frame. More advanced writers can record several facts or compare two reptiles.

5. Reptile Fact or Reptile Myth?

Write several reptile statements on cards and ask students to decide whether each one is a fact or a myth.

Students can use the fact booklets to check their answers. This activity reinforces reading comprehension while helping correct common misunderstandings.

Reptile Awareness Day offers a valuable opportunity to help children understand animals that are often feared, avoided, or misunderstood.

Through fact booklets, drawing, writing, reading, habitat building, movement, and comparison activities, young learners can investigate reptiles from many different directions.

Most importantly, children can learn that understanding an animal does not mean touching, approaching, or interfering with it. Respecting wildlife means giving animals space, protecting their habitats, and appreciating the roles they play in nature.

This October, invite your young scientists to slither, swim, and crawl into learning. When children replace fear with accurate information, they begin to see snakes, sea turtles, and alligators not simply as frightening creatures, but as remarkable animals worthy of understanding and protection. 

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