For the faith series, I shared the 4th Commandment, thanks to Jill and her posts on Compassion Family. I found pretty coloring pages for the verses Matthew 22:37 and Romans 15:13.
I also wrote about penguins since both Emily and Earl John requested more information about them! I got my information from Science Kids, Penguin World, and National Geographic Kids. Feel free to send the penguin letter to your kids!
Hello Friend!
I wanted to share with you a bit about penguins! Penguins are a bird, but they cannot fly! They use their wings like flippers to help them swim through the water! Large penguin populations can be found in countries such as New Zealand, Australia, Chile, Argentina and South Africa. Penguins also live in Antartica, but not on the North Pole. Penguins eat a range of fish and other sealife that they catch underwater and can drink sea water. They spend around half their time in water and the other half on land.
There are 17 species of penguins in the world! The Emperor Penguin is the tallest of all penguin species, reaching as tall as 120 centimeters in height; Emperor Penguins can stay underwater for around 20 minutes at a time and often huddle together to keep warm in the cold temperatures of Antarctica. Emperor Penguins have to stay warm in the Antarctic temperatures which can get as low as -90 Celsius. They breed in the winter. After a courtship of several weeks, a female Emperor Penguin lays one single egg then leaves! Each penguin egg's father balances it on his feet and covers it with his brood pouch, a very warm layer of feathered skin designed to keep the egg cozy. There the males stand, for about 65 days, through icy temperatures, cruel winds, and blinding storms. Finally, after about two months, the females return from the sea, bringing food they regurgitate, or bring up, to feed the now hatched chicks. The males eagerly leave for their own fishing session at sea, and the mothers take over care of the chicks for a while. As the young penguins grow, adults leave them in groups of chicks while they leave to fish. There is a reason for the timing of emperor penguins' hatching. By December, when the Antarctic weather has warmed somewhat, the ice the penguins occupy begins to break up, bringing open waters closer to the nesting sites. Now the chicks are old enough to take to the seas and fish for their own food.
King Penguins are the second largest penguin specie. They have four layers of feathers to help keep them warm on the cold subantarctic islands where they breed. They typically live north of the Emperor Penguin (where it is slightly warmer) on many different islands. Erect-Crested penguins have yellow crests, as well as red bills and eyes and typically live in New Zealand, like the Yellow Eyed penguins (or Hoiho) which are endangered penguins native to New Zealand. Another penguin species native to New Zealand are the Little Penguins, which are the smallest species at 33 centimeters tall.
Love, Hannah
I found the coloring page here and the photos of the penguins from Penguin World, and National Geographic Kids.
In my response letters, I focused on friendship and sent my kids a poem! I got the idea from Keeli, who blogs at Perfectly Lucky. You can find the friendship poem here. For the letters that required a longer response, I uploaded a jpg of a typewritten response. I love how we can add so many attachments!
