Tag Archives: ducks

Revisiting the ugly duckling

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The last time The ugly duckling came along in our K-2 literacy cycle, I made use of some personal photos taken of a Hans Christian Andersen memorial statue at Sydney’s Observatory Hill.


The ugly duckling – Silly symphony Walt Disney 1939


Our Khaki Campbell ducks~


Khaki Campbell… ducks a must see!!!

Make way for ducklings, the famous picture book by Robert McCloskey, and based on a real life event, is also immortalized in statue form at Boston Common, USA. These statues get dressed thematically at various times of the year.

The ugly duckling

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This weeks fairy tale for Early Stage 1 and Stage 1 students is The ugly duckling by Hans Christian Andersen. We will be using the picture book adaptation by Masumi Furukawa (Flip up fairy tales series by Child’s Play, 2006).

Ugly duckling
The ugly duckling

Hans Christian Andersen bust
Hans Christian Andersen (1805-1875) bust

Hans Christian Andersen on Observatory Hill
Hans Christian Andersen on Observatory Hill, Sydney

Digital stories:

The ugly duckling, an assembly item by Class 2FR (from the year 2010)

The ugly caterpillar, a digital fairy tale by Class 1K (also from 2010), loosely based on “The ugly duckling”

Cockatoo and Tiger, a digital narrative by the other half of Class 1K (2010), also inspired by “The ugly duckling”.

Next week, the work will be followed up with an investigation into the attributes of ducks. The books, What is a bird? by Feana Tu’akoi (Scholastic, 2007) and Amazing facts about Australian birds (Steve Parish discover and learn, 1997) by Pat Slater, will be contrasted with the fictional ducks featured in Duck in the truck (Picture lions, HarperCollins, 2000) by Jez Alborough, Vote for Duck (Pocket, 2004) by Doreen Cronin & Betsy Lewin and The goat, the duck and the bale of hay (Viking, 2004) by Rachel Flynn & Tom Jellett.