ANZAC Day Printables and Activities

Because I’m American (and we are routinely terrible about learning other peoples’ history), I don’t know a lot about ANZAC Day, though I have shared some ANZAC Day activities before. If you’re also unfamiliar, it’s basically considered the Australia and New Zealand version of Memorial Day in the states, and it commemorates the Battle of Gallipoli in World War I.

ANZAC stands for Australia New Zealand Army Corps, and the Battle of Gallipoli was their first engagement in the war. You can learn some of the basics with this mini unit study printable from Simply Creative Learning, which is aimed at kids ages 5-10. It includes history, the ANZAC ode, the story of Simpson and his donkey and why poppies are often seen on ANZAC Day.

(Simpson refers to John Simpson Kirkpatrick, better known as John Simpson, who used donkeys to help carry the wounded away from the battle.)

Peace Through Grace has a free 20 page printable pack for ANZAC Day, which includes reading, writing, science and craft activities, and it uses immersive storytelling to make the facts more real and relatable for kids. This one is also aimed at kids ages 5-10, but you could adapt it for older kids as well.

The Sydney Teacher has a printable pack that includes a poppy to color, comprehension passage about ANZAC biscuits, and a recipe for making them. (ANZAC biscuits were a food that became popular during the war because of their long shelf life.)

Another great learning pack comes from Laughing Kids Learn. This one includes hands on activities, coloring pages and a word scramble, as well as facts, printable posters, writing exercises, comprehension worksheets and more. You can buy it direct from her Teachers Pay Teachers store.

Little Learner Hub on Teachers Pay Teachers also has an activity for making ANZAC biscuits, which includes the recipe and a worksheet where kids can describe the process.

If you want to dig more into the stories of ANZAC Day in a way that’s appropriate for kids, check out this picture book list from A Few Small Adventures.

Did you know that October is Squirrel Awareness Month? I didn’t know we needed more awareness of these little creatures, but let’s take it as a sign to learn more about squirrels!

Let’s start with some fun facts via Kids Konnect: did you know there are five subfamilies and more that 280 species of squirrels? The smallest are pygmy squirrels and the largest, the Bhutan giant flying squirrel, can be longer that 4 feet (1.2 meters).

Tree squirrels can climb down trees so fast because their ankles can rotate 180 degrees, allowing them to grab the tree bark as they go down. While most squirrels don’t survive their first year of life, they can live five to 10 years in the wild and squirrels have been known to live up to 20 years in captivity!

Rhythms of Play has more fun facts and tips for observing squirrels if you want to add some real life nature to your nature study.

We always like to start these collections with life cycle and parts of the animal printables, so let’s grab the squirrel life cycle an parts of a squirrel worksheets from Montessori Nature. (It doesn’t look like these are free any more but they have a whole unit study on squirrels you can buy that includes life cycle and parts activities, characteristics of different kinds of squirrels, a printable poster, information about predators and more.)

Grab the squirrel lapbook printable (free with email address) from Homeschool Share to learn the parts of a squirrel, where they live, what they eat, whether they hibernate and more. There’s also a nut taste test printable, a place for making observations about squirrels, life cycle of an oak tree, games and more.

Simple Everyday Mom has some cute squirrel themed worksheets including tracing the letter s, labeling the parts of a squirrel and a letter s maze. She also has more activity pages with a squirrel theme, including matching, a more traditional maze and a counting and graphing activity.

Work on letter recognition with this squirrel and acorn game printable from Teaching Mama. I love the idea of hiding the letters in a fall themed sensory bin for kids to find, identify and match to the letter on the worksheet.

For older kids you can do this “if I were a squirrel” writing prompt from Lesson Planet.

And throw in a little counting with these squirrel and acorn tens frame printables from JDaniel4’s Mom, which you can use to count real acorns or any other little fall themed thing you have handy.

Have you read?

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