Great Bears

GUMMI BEARS (WITH SCIENCE)

	Gummi bears were invented in Germany and have been around since the 1920s. Read about them at The History of Gummy Bears.
	How to Make Gummy Bears has illustrated instructions for making gummy bears (etc.) of your own.
	At Gummy Bear Science Experiments, study osmosis with gummy bears. Also see Candy Chemistry Experiments (make dancing gummy bears) and Steve Spangler’s Incredible Swimming Gummy Bears

 BEAR POEMS AND SONGS

	A.A. Milne’s Furry Bear appears in the poetry collection Now We Are Six, originally published in 1927.
	In Ogden Nash’s The Adventures of Isabel, Isabel first meets an enormous bear. (But Isabel, Isabel, doesn’t care.)
	For teenagers and up, see Robert Frost’s poem The Bear.
	Just in case you’ve forgotten the words to “The Bear Came Over the Mountain” or “Teddy Bear, Teddy Bear, Turn Around,” see these Preschool Bear Songs.
	By Seamus Kennedy, Waltzing with Bears is a You Tube rendition of the folksong with a background of bears. (“There’s nothing on earth Uncle Walter won’t do/So he can go waltzing, wa-wa-wa-waltzing/Waltzing with bears!”)

BEARS AND MATH

	By Barbara Barbieri McGrath, Teddy Bear Counting (Charlesbridge Publishing, 2010) is the first of the McGrath Math series, picture books that use colorful teddy bears to teach introductory math concepts. Other titles in the series include Teddy Bear Math and Teddy Bear Patterns. For ages 4-7.
	Pair the books with a set of Baby Bear Counters. (102 bears in six different colors; about $13.)
	Learn a bit of geometry and make a cool bear face with this Circles Bear craft from First Palette.
	In Stuart J. Murphy’s The Grizzly Gazette (HarperCollins, 2002) – a MathStart book – the campers at Camp Grizzly are electing a mascot; winner gets to wear the camp’s famous grizzly bear costume. Each day the Grizzly Gazette polls the 100 campers and publishes graphs showing the percentage of votes that go to each candidate. For ages 6-9.

BEAR ARTS AND CRAFTS

	Make colorful cardstock bear cards.
	Teddy Bears and Other Bears Too has a selection of bear-themed projects and activities, among them making teddy-bear bird food and a cinnamon-dough teddy bear ornament.
	Make a calico Bear Doll.
	Make a Sock Teddy Bear. The site has illustrated instructions for making a perfectly adorable bear from a striped sock.
	For the committed teddy-bear-maker, Abigail Patner Glassenberg’s Stuffed Animals (Lark Crafts, 2013) has detailed instructions and templates for 16 different projects, among them a classic teddy bear. For teenagers and adults.
	Meg Leach’s Knitted Finger Puppets (Martingale & Co., 2008) has patterns and instructions for 34 different puppets, among them Goldilocks and the Three Bears.
	Chocolate Teddy Bear Cupcakes. This recipe makes eight.