1-2-3 Come Do Some "Wemberly Worried" Activities With Me

No matter what grade I taught, to get students excited about writing, all I had to do was incorporate a bit of craftiness, to get & hold their attention.

With that in mind, I designed these super-fun writing prompt craftivities, which were inspired by Kevin Henkes’ book, “Wemberly Worried”, an all-time favorite back to school story.

I think realizing that others also have fears, helps children not feel so alone when dealing with their own emotions; especially if they find someone who shares the same worry (Like Wemberly & Jewel).

Hopefully, these various writing prompts will provide cathartic fun.

1. There are 14 cover options for the “Sometimes I worry about…” craftivity, which includes 5 girl & 5 boy patterns.

Students color & draw in the facial features. There’s also a generic pattern, plus one featuring Wemberly, as well as a blank template where students can draw themselves inside the “worry circle”.

The cover is then glued to the top of their writing prompt so it flips up.

2. So that you can do a variety of quick, easy & fun writing activities throughout the week, I’ve also included 4, “point of view” postcards, where students pretend they are Wemberly and then write a postcard to a classmate.

3. Students need to know that everyone worries; it’s normal and there are coping skills to help. Which is why I also designed the “Flip the Face” (Mice Advice) craftivity.

Students color, cut and glue Wemberly’s face together, so that it flips up to reveal something they do to help with their worries.

I think this prompt is easier for students to “share” because they feel they are helping others.

4. As another story extension, I’ve also included several Venn diagram options, where students compare Jewel with Wemberly, as well as Wemberly to themselves.

For a fun icebreaker, have students partner up, and do the “Venn Friend” activity, which make an adorable back to school bulletin board.

5. A discussion helps to alleviate fears as well, so I’ve included a whole-group activity, comparing young people’s worries with those of adults.

6. To help get rid of worries, I’ve also included 2 worksheet options, where students write their worries on a large W or “pencil page”, then rip their worries into small pieces, ball them up into a wad, then “toss their cares into the trash”.

7. On the same order, is “Give your worry warts away”, where students give their warts to Wharton the toad, who never worries about anything. 

The warts are simply colorful stickers they sprinkle on one of two toad options. 

To expedite coloring, I ran the patterns off on tan construction paper.  Students add some shading with crayons. 

On the back of Wharton, they write down 3-8 worries that they have, numbering them as they go.

On the front of their toad, they number that many "worry wart" stickers.

The "worry ball" that Wharton sits on says: Don't Worry Be "HOppy".  While students are working, I play Bobby McFerrin's song. Click the link to have a listen. 

I've included several photo posters of real toads to help introduce your lesson, then later they can spice up your bulletin board display.

Today's featured FREEBIE is "Chalk Talk".  Great for back to school or anytime.

The packet includes:

* A “Chalk” behavior modification, positive reinforcement activity, that will help promote working as a team to achieve a desired goal, building self-esteem at the same time.

* Black & White “color me” headers, for a sidewalk chalk treat Baggie, as well as patterns in full color for preschool, kindergarten, & first grade, with a blank template for you to fill in with any other grade. I’ve also included a generic one you can give at anytime of the year.

* A “Chalk Talk” bear poster you can write a daily message on.
* A “Chalk Talk” kitten poster wishing children a “purrr-fect” day. Plus...

* 2, Chalk Talk ("I had a nice time at school today. These are a few of the things that I did:" ) writing prompt worksheets.

Well that's it for today. Thanks for stopping by.

It's the middle of August, so my feet have hit the floor running.  My "To Do" list is way too long, but it's also a ton of fun. 

Wishing you a zippidy-do-dah kind of day, filled with lots of zip and not so much "to do" dah.

"You're off to great places. Today is your day.  Your mountain is waiting so get on your way!" - Dr. Seuss

 1-2-3 Come Do Some Back To School Activities With Me

The other kiddie lit packets have been such popular downloads, that I thought I'd do a bit more with one of my all time favorite back to school stories.  I designed this quick and easy-to-do packet, around Laura Numeroff's book, If You Take A Mouse To School.

The packet includes a class made book.  Run off the master and have students complete the writing prompt: If you take a child to kindergarten they will...

I've included templates for preschool through second grade, plus a blank one to fill in with whatever you teach.  There are also matching covers.

They color the mouse and then illustrate their page.  Younger students can dictate their thoughts to you or a room helper.  Collect, collate and add a cover.  Read together as a whole group activity, as each child shares their own page.  

Be sure and make a sample of your own.  I made up an example that you could also share or use as a sweet poster.

I've also included bookmarks for children to color. 

Older students can write why they had a great first day on the back.

Click on the link to view/download the If You Take A Child To School packet. Thanks for visiting today.  Feel free to PIN away. 

I've been designing so many things this morning that my brain is on overdrive and feeling very cluttered.  One of those seasick kind of headaches is coming on, so it's time to take a much-needed break and go play outside to defog my mind.  Wishing you all the best and a very happy day.

"Art enables us to find and lose ourselves at the same time." -Thomas Merton 

1-2-3 Come Review A Great Back To School Book With Me

Since the Miss Nelson Is Missing packet has been such a popular download, I decided to whip together a few more activities to accompany one of my favorite back to school books.

An interesting way to review the story, as well as reinforce rules for appropriate grammar, is with the Miss Nelson Is Missing punctuation cards.  Hang the cards on your board and read them together as a whole group. 

Choose a student to come up and circle letters that should be capitalized explaining why and then have another child add end punctuation. 

You can also do this with a pointer and pocket chart or pass one card out to each child to correct with a dry erase marker. 

After eveyone has shared their card, have students choose 3-6 cards and rewrite the sentences correctly.  This is a great Daily 5 word work activity too.

Another idea is to run off copies of all of the cards, have students trim and collate into a mini booklet, where they make corrections.

Encourage children to read their Miss Nelson booklet to their family, explaining what they did, as they retell the story.

Click on the link to view/download the Miss Nelson Is Missing Punctuation Cards.  Thanks for visiting today. 

I hope you are getting excited to start another school year, but still making time to relax and enjoy the rest of your summer too.  Wishing you all the best...

A Great Back To School Book: Chrysanthemum!

I designed the Chrysanthemum packet to help reinforce LOTS of Common Core State Standards in quick, easy and fun ways.

As with The Kissing Hand Packet featured in yesterday's article, this packet reinforces Common Core State Standards: RI.K5,RI.K6,RI.K9,RI.K10,RL.K2, RL.K3,RL.K6, L.K1d, RI.1.9, RL.1.2, RL.1.3

The packet includes:

• A beginning-middle-end story map, that will help students retell Chrysanthemum
• A "favorite part" retelling "writing prompt" bookmark
• A compare and contrast Venn diagram with Hooway For Wodney Wat
  
  • Character, Setting and Event cards. (Laminate, put magnets on the back and put them up on your white board. Write down students' answers under the cards.)
  • Cover to label book parts + review author and illustrator
  • Question words activity sheet, reinforcing who, what, why, when, where & how
  • 2 cover templates for the following activity:

I use the book Chrysanthemum as a wonderful lead-in story that the nursery rhyme: “Sticks and stones may hurt my bones but names will never harm me” is simply NOT true’ as words can be very mean AND hurtful!

I Xerox off the cover of the book Chrysanthemum, by Kevin Henkes, and read the story.

Each time someone hurts Chrysanthemum's feelings, I pass the paper around the circle.

We each crumple up the paper, say "I'm sorry" and then smooth it out.  By the time I am done reading the story, the picture of Chrysanthemum is in shreds and full of holes as well.

We discuss the fact that words hurt, and even though we say that we are sorry and “smooth things out” with that person, we have still hurt them.

The words sort of leave “scars” on their heart and in their mind, just like the dilapidated paper visually demonstrates.

I cut out a large red paper heart and glue the poor shredded cover of Chrysanthemum next to a fresh cover, as a gentle reminder to think before you speak, as words DO make a difference.

I also want children to understand that being critical of each other and saying things like "I don't want to be your friend” and leaving them out of a group when they play, is also hurtful.

I'll ask them a question like: “How would you feel if Mrs. Henderson said that to you?”, or how would they feel if I gave everyone else a toy or piece of candy, or let everyone go out for recess and didn't let them go?  It really gives them a wake up call.

Chrysanthemum discusses making fun of a child’s name.  Hooway For Wodney Wat is a wonderful book that delves into bullying and making fun of a child with a speech impediment.

This is a great comparison-contrast book to work on that Common Core Standard, using a Venn diagram that once again brings home the fact that teasing is hurtful.

Click on the link to view/download Chrysanthemum Packet Thank you for visiting today. Hope you can pop back tomorrow for more helpful tips. Feel free to PIN anything you think others may find useful.

“All you need is a plan, a road map, and the courage to press on to your destination.” –Earl Nightingale

If You Take A Mouse To School and If You Give A Mouse A Cookie: Fun Back To School Books

Whenever I can, I like to make up lessons that go with favorite books. It’s a plus to have an activity that reinforces standards, for students to transition to, after reading a story.

If You Take A Mouse To School, and If You Give A Mouse A Cookie, by Laura Joffe Numeroff are 2 wonderful stories to read in September. I do a take off of these books with my easy reader: If You Give A Mouse A Letter He'll Want The Whole Alphabet.

Students read the sentence, then trace and write the letters.  When everyone is done, read the booklet as a whole group to review concepts of print as well as upper and lowercase letters.

Run off a set of the 52 upper and lowercase mouse letter cards, laminate and cut them apart.  Pass them out to your students.  As you read the story, whomever has those letter cards drops them into the mouse pail.

To make a mouse to "feed", run off my template, cut him out, glue him to brown construction paper and slit the line above the letter box. Staple a Quaker oat box or Baggie behind the slit.

Besides the easy reader, this 32-page packet includes:

• A feed the mouse template
• Upper and lowercase matching skill sheet
• Upper and lowercase trace and write skills sheets
• 4 "What's Missing?" upper and lowercase skill sheets
• Circle the letters of your name skill sheet
• An upper and lowercase letter assessment
• 26 upper and lowercase letter cards + covers to make Itty Bitty Booklets
• 2 assessments +
• 3 certificates of praise

The packet will help with Common Core State Standards: RF.K1d & L.1.1a.  Click on the link to view/download If You Give A Mouse A Letter Packet

Shapes are another standard that my Y5's have to master, so I also did an If You Give A Mouse A Shape packet.

Here you'll find two easy readers, two graphing extensions + several worksheets.

One easy reader is entitled: If You Give A Mouse A Shape (These are 2D shapes.)

The other is: If You Give A Mouse a 3D Shape. 

Along these same lines, is the If You Take A _________ To School class-made book, where students think up another animal they'd like to take to school and then write and illustrate their page. 

I've also included the Mary Had A Little Lamb nursery rhyme in this packet.

Thanks for visiting today. I'm onto yet another project.  So many fun things to do, so little time... I bet you can relate. 

“Little by little does the trick!” –Abraham Lincoln

An Old Favorite...

The Gist: A boy takes a mouse to school.

Why I like it:

• It's another fun book in a collection of "If you..." books.
• This book has more episodes than the previous books: "If you give a pig a pancake, she'll want some syrup to go with it." 
• I, along with my students, enjoy this simple "cause and effect" story line.
• The illustrator, Felicia Bond, draws an adorable mouse, doing adorable humanistic things, like putting on tiny bib overhauls, drawing on the blackboard, sniffling, etc.
• The mouse and his auburn-haired boy sidekick are very endearing.

Story Telling Tips:

Make sequencing manipulatives for the story by printing off my master, laminating the sheets and then cutting them out. Pass them out to your students.

Make a blue jean cup to store the pieces in by running off a copy of the blue jeans on blue construction paper. 

Cut out the jeans and place them on the front of a clear plastic cup using several glue dots.  Cut out two 8 1/2 inch strips of blue construction paper and tape them to the back of the blue jeans. 

Loop the "jean straps" over the cup and fasten them to the back of the cup with glue dots. Put 2 white reinforcement holes on the front of the jeans to look like buttons.

If you wanted to make a cute treat as a surprise for your students, these would make darling cups for them.  Fill a snack Baggie with miniature chocolate chip cookies, or a medium baggie with one large cookie and then tuck it in the cup. 

Students can make their own blue jeans and then take this home at the end of the day with their mouse (art project) tucked in the cup as well. 

You could also read If You Give A Mouse A Cookie and compare both stories.  If you do read both stories, you may want to add a math extension and graph which book your students liked the best. 

When you pass the manipulatives out to your students and you come to that particular item in the story, where the mouse would want that "thing",  the child holding that piece puts the item on your white or flannel board. 

Magic Trick:

I put a pink pom pom, a scrap of brown paper, a wiggle eye and a piece of brown yarn into my change bag.  The children clap their hands 3 times and say: "If you take a mouse to school..."

I produce a paper mouse.  I ask my students if they would like to make one.  Of course they say "Yes!" They then transition to their desks and make a mouse.

Art Project:  Paper Pom Pom Mouse:

Run off the mouse on brown construction paper. Fold the paper in half.  Remind students to keep their paper FOLDED.  When they open it up their paper will be heart-shaped because they LOVE story time. 

There is a message inside for their parents to read.  Students sign the card and re-fold it, turning it into a mouse by adding a pom pom nose, wiggle eye, ears and yarn tail.

Have your students fill in the blanks and illustrate their page.  Collect the pages, collate your class book and then read it to your class. Set it in your class library so that students can read it whenever they wish.

The "Mice" activities will remain FREE for the month of September 2011. Click on the link to print them; after September they can be purchased for only .59 cents under Mice Activities.

 Etc.:

I teach around several themes for September:

Click on each link for a list of my favorite BACK-TO-SCHOOL themed books,  Bibliography for MORE Back-To-School books,  TRAIN books,  DINOSAUR books, APPLE books, and MONKEY books.

You can also click on the links to view/print our FREE Easy Readers this month:  My September Senses,  My Spatial Direction Bus Booklet, & The Students On the Bus. 

To get my parents involved in reading to their children, I have a RAH-RAH program. It stands for "Read At Home." Click on the link for directions, poster, bookmarks, certificate, reading logs and a letter home.

Each day we have a WOW Day. It stands for Wonderful Outstanding Word of the day.

It helps build my students' vocabulary. Click on the link for a mini-poster You can also get a mini-poster of  ZIPPY to remind your  students that it's time for reading and you need a Quiet Zone.

Whatever you're reading this month, I hope you and your students are able to "fall" into lots of good books!

READ on!

An Old Favorite:

I chose Mary Wore A Red Dress for this month’s book pick, because young children enjoy it.

It’s one of those “Read it again; read it again!” stories.

Learning colors is one of my report card standards and having color words as part of the word wall and doing a variety of things with colors, is a big part of most teacher’s back-to-school activities, so I thought this was a good choice to dream up some activities for you to do with your students.

The Gist: Why I Love it:

Mary Wore A Red Dress is an old Texas folk song. I love it because it provides the perfect Segway to the introduction of colors.

In this particular version, animals are on their way to a birthday party.  I also like that the author includes the music at the end of the story.

Story Telling Tips:

• Use the colored clothing pieces that I have made to match the story and pass them out to students.  This is the perfect “sequencing” story.
• When the “orange” shirt is read, the child who has the orange shirt piece adds it to the flannel or white board.

• After reading the story, mix up the pieces and see if the children can remember the order they came in.
• Substitute students’ names for character names.  Watch little ones’ eyes light up when you say their name.  “Am I really in the book?” They’ll ask. It gets them to really pay attention.

•  I say the colors in English as well as Spanish and have the children repeat them back to me.
• Another thing you can have students do is to stand up if they are wearing the color that is being talked about in the story. i.e., Mary is wearing a red dress.

•  If you’re also wearing red, stand up.
• Children can wiggle their fingers, touch their nose, take a bow or do something silly, point to that color and then sit down.

Magic Tricks: I use my change bag to produce different colored scarves to teach secondary colors.  “What color was Mary wearing?” Yes, red.  Did you know that red and yellow make orange?”

I put a red scarf and a yellow scarf in the change bag and have children exclaim:

“ _______________ wore an orange shirt!” Then I pop out an orange scarf.  I do the same thing when I produce a green scarf (blue + yellow) and a purple scarf (red + blue).

 If I have time, I let students smear what ever primary color combination they want together, to turn a white paper tee-shirt into a secondary color.  I then hang these on a clothesline with mini clothespins.

Math: 5 graphing extensions, connect the dots, & count how many and write the number skill sheet.

Writing Extensions: 2 Class books: We Wore __________ To School! and On the First Day Of School Who Did You See?

Art Activity: (T-shirt idea above.) Click on the link for a copy of a t-shirt to paint.

Language Arts: Trace to pre-write skill sheet, matching colors, alphabetical order, rhyming words.

Click on the link to view/print the She Wore A Red Dress Packet. This packet will be FREE til September 16th and then can be purchased for only .99 cents. 

 Bibliography for Back-To-School: Click on the link to view my favorites.

Be sure and check out our FREEBIE reader of the month: Where Are The Coconuts?  This is a great booklet to go along with any of your Chicka Chicka Boom Boom activities.

  If you’re a big fan of Chicka Chicka  Boom Boom, be sure and check out the Arts-Crafts and Activities section.  That is my major theme this month. 

Our free "Easy Reader" this month is The Students On the Bus, a great math extension booklet and a real keepsake when you add a few photographs.

Whatever you're reading this month, I hope it's simply T-riffic!  Happy August.