Animal Soup: A divergent thinking activity for K-2

Friday, November 28, 2014


Need a fun divergent thinking activity to inspire and engage your K-2 students? Try making animal soup! This post includes free printables and implementation ideas to make creativity in the classroom a breeze!

Hi All! I am checking in today to share one of my favorite K-2 activities - Animal Soup! Animal Soup, by Paul Doodler, is a short, lift-the-flap book that combines everyday animals to create silly outcomes.

Need a fun divergent thinking activity to inspire and engage your K-2 students? Try making animal soup! This post includes free printables and implementation ideas to make creativity in the classroom a breeze!

Let's check out how it works! Below are two sample pages from the book. After considering the question, students can lift the flap to see the 3rd page. Give it a try:

What would you be if you had wings to fly like a bird . . .

Need a fun divergent thinking activity to inspire and engage your K-2 students? Try making animal soup! This post includes free printables and implementation ideas to make creativity in the classroom a breeze!

and walked slowly like a turtle?

Need a fun divergent thinking activity to inspire and engage your K-2 students? Try making animal soup! This post includes free printables and implementation ideas to make creativity in the classroom a breeze!

A BiRdLe! 

Need a fun divergent thinking activity to inspire and engage your K-2 students? Try making animal soup! This post includes free printables and implementation ideas to make creativity in the classroom a breeze!


Seriously, this book cracks me up every year! My favorite combination is the flamingo and monkey. (A flamonkey :-)

Once we read the story as a class, I give students the task of creating their own animal. Each student selects two animal cards. (I cut the cards and put them in a "magic box" prior to the lesson. Students randomly select their animals from the magic box; it makes the selection of the animals for their soup a little dramatic and a lot of fun!)
Need a fun divergent thinking activity to inspire and engage your K-2 students? Try making animal soup! This post includes free printables and implementation ideas to make creativity in the classroom a breeze!

Students then glue the cards to the activity sheet below.

Need a fun divergent thinking activity to inspire and engage your K-2 students? Try making animal soup! This post includes free printables and implementation ideas to make creativity in the classroom a breeze!download here for free


From here, students combine elements of each animal's name to create a new animal species. Some examples might include:

  • alligator + gorilla = gorillagator
  • lion + dinosaur = linosaur
  • monkey + kangaroo = monkaroo
  • puppy + hippopotamus = puppyotamus
Because the goal is to develop divergent thinking skills, I frequently remind students that there is more than one correct answer. For example, if you were part alligator and part octopus, you could be an allipus, an octigator, or a gatorpus. The possibilities are endless.

Then they draw a picture to illustrate their animal soup creation. Here are a few examples from one of my first grade nurturing lessons:

Need a fun divergent thinking activity to inspire and engage your K-2 students? Try making animal soup! This post includes free printables and implementation ideas to make creativity in the classroom a breeze!



Need a fun divergent thinking activity to inspire and engage your K-2 students? Try making animal soup! This post includes free printables and implementation ideas to make creativity in the classroom a breeze!



Need a fun divergent thinking activity to inspire and engage your K-2 students? Try making animal soup! This post includes free printables and implementation ideas to make creativity in the classroom a breeze!


Oftentimes, I compile the student pictures and make it into a class book. Most times, the kids are too eager to take them home right away to share :-)

You can download the activity sheet and animal cards for FREE here.
Need a fun divergent thinking activity to inspire and engage your K-2 students? Try making animal soup! This post includes free printables and implementation ideas to make creativity in the classroom a breeze!



To learn more about fun ways to nurture creative thinking in the classroom, check out two of my earlier posts: Let's Get Creative and Creativity in the Classroom. Thanks for checking in!

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