GALS - Giant African Land Snail Activities for Preschool, Nursery and Early Years:
Two great Snail counting/matching/sorting sheets, in an easy to print PDF format ~ Many thanks to Supersonicsnail of
TheSnailTrail.co.uk forums for permission to use the photos
COUNTING GALS ~ click to download
The two GAL Snail breeds that feature in the photos are
Fulica ~ the most common which are brown and stripy ~ these lay eggs that take about 2 weeks to hatch.
You can safely dispose of the eggs before homes are needed for them all
~ by putting the eggs into a bag and freezing them for 48 hours before throwing them away.
The Snail Trails breeding Awareness campaign
The other Giant African Land Snail featured is
Iredalei or Blond snail.. these are one of the few specie that actually give birth to live baby snails !!
Unless you have knowledge and homes already lined up for the resulting babies, it would be better to decline owning this particular specie as a pet.
Early Learning Activities
PSED ~ Personal Social & Emotional Developement
Caring for snails ~ Circle time activity
Giant African Land Snails ~ Keynote suggestions for you to talk to the children about :-
- Giant African Land Snails make good pets, they are unusual and fun to watch.
- GALS are very sociable, this means that they like having friends in the same tank.
- When there are two Snails living together they can have lots of babies, so sometimes it's better to only have one snail in a tank.
- Cucumber and vegetables are the GALS favourite food.
- They also need 'Cuttlefish to eat ~ this is full of calcium which makes their shells nice and strong.
- The bottom of their tank should have substrate in it .. this is soil or compost and is the same as having soft carpet in a bedroom to play on !
- Snails also like things to play with ~ Branches and pieces of clean wood.
- GALS come from a hot Country and need the air around them to be warm and moist ~ spraying water around the Snails needs to be done each day.
CLL ~ Communication Language & Literacy
Snail Books
Use a selection of story fact & fiction to introduce snails to the Children.
Snail Trail ~ by Ruth Brown
The Whale and the Snail ~ by Julia Donaldson and Axel Scheffler
M ~ Mathmatics
Size & Counting Sheets ~ PDF
Copyright©Supersonicsnail2007
K&U of the W ~ Knowledge & Understanding of the World
Habitat and Home
Build a Snail tank ~ use a large see through platic box and make a 'house for it to live in ...
Compost, Leaves, Branches, Food dish, Plastic pots (Teracotta ones could break the snails shell if it falls from the tank roof onto it !!)
P ~ Physical
Skateboard snails
If you have some larger skateboards available, play Snail trails.
Ask the children to take turns in lying on the skateboard ~ push the board slowly at a 'Snails pace' bewtween two adults.
C ~ creative
Playdough Snails
Roll large sausage shaped pieces of dough and then curl up for the snail shell.
Use pipecleans as the Snails antennae and sequins to give the shells some decoration.
Pastry Snails ~ Cooking & Snack
Cheese and Marmite pinwheels can be made to accompany a Snail themed snack time.
Roll out pre-made pastry ( or make your own with the children)
Water down some Marmite/Vegemite so that is is spreadable ~ 'paint the surface of the pastry.
Sprinkle on grated cheese.
Roll up carefully in to a sausage shape.
Cut into 2cm slices
Place onto a greased baking tray.
Cook at 350f ~ 180c ~ Gas mk 3 (I think
!! lol )
for approx 15minutes
Allow to cool and serve with banana milkshake drinks or Chilled water + ice cubes, Cucumber & apple slices ~~~ Chocolate Milk & White buttons
yumm
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Have fun ...
GALS - Giant African Land Snail Activities
Toys !!
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