Lockdown Day 50 – Nocturnal and Diurnal
Knowledge and Understanding of the World
Who would have thought we would get as far as 50 posts! Half a century! What a milestone!
It has been a fun journey, thinking up creative ways of helping you connect with your children in meaningful and inspiring ways.
Today’s post is once again based in the natural world and explores an interesting characteristic common to all animals. They need to rest! Koala bears need the most sleep in a day – 22 hours! Giraffes on the other hand sleep for less than 2 hours a day.
Children love to categorise and classify the world around them, so let’s look at animal sleeping habits in terms of those animals that like to sleep at night (like most humans) and those who sleep in the day. Animals that are awake and active in the day are known as DIURNAL animals. Ask the child if s/he can think of animals that s/he has seen during the day. Many garden birds, geckos, lizards, cows, sheep, horses and monkeys are examples of diurnal animals.
NOCTURNAL animals are awake and active at night. Children are often less aware of these animals and this would be a perfect opportunity to introduce the child to some night creatures. Explain that nocturnal animals often have a more acute sense of smell and of hearing as their sense of sight is not used as much at night. Many of the big cats hunt at night and rodents like mice and hamsters are nocturnal. Owls are probably the most commonly mentioned nocturnal bird, and there are many species to discover.
You could simply have conversations about these or print off some pictures (roughly postcard-sized) of both nocturnal and diurnal animals for the child to separate into two columns.
Another fun activity may be top create little rhymes like these, simply changing the animal names as you learn about new animals in each category.
The aardvark is nocturnal, the honey badger too, we however sleep and night and so do YOU!
During the day,
the monkeys play,
the antelope run
and the bees have fun!
Just for interest’s sake, you may think that the world of animals is limited to nocturnal and diurnal animals, but you would be wrong…
Did you know that some animals are AURORAL and others CREPUSCULAR?
Go and look those up to share with your children!