1-2-3 Come Do Some Gingerbread Activities With Me

Our Gingerbread theme was one of my Y5's favorites for December. (Mine too!)  It's pretty neutral, so if your district is picky about what you can and can't do at your school, perhaps gingerbread will be "appropriate".

A few years ago I designed the schoolhouse fact family packet, followed up by the haunted house fact families, so why not make a winter-themed fact family right; what could be more fitting for a winter fact family than a gingerbread house? 

I've made some revisions and added a few more things to this newest collection of fact family houses.  I hope you enjoy today's FREEBIE. Click on the link to grab it. Gingerbread Fact Family Houses.

I really like it when my activities match, so I've used D. H. Inkers' adorable gingerbread house for a variety of lessons that I hope you'll enjoy.

I had a special request from Erin, in Montana, for gingerbread house number cards, so I got busy and whipped those together. 

I've included math symbols and counter tiles, so you can do even more things with them + games and several bookmarks.

I also dreamed up an odd and even sorting mat, and thought it would be cute to sort via odd or even gingerbread house "address" numbers. 

To practice the format for writing an address, as well as help children memorize their zip code, I've included a "give your gingerbread an address" activity.

When I made up my sample, I wondered if there really was a city named Christmas Cove and to my delight there was!  It's in Maine, the state my son Steven, was born in.  There's also a Christmas, Michigan (my home state) as well as a Christmas, Florida. (Oh to be there right now!)  Simply Google cities with holiday names, for a list of all sorts of sites, with this fun trivia.

If your kiddo’s want to locate their gingerbread house close to Santa, 99705 is the zip code listed when I googled Alaska and clicked on North Pole.  There’s nothing there for over 400 miles though; and just an FYI The North Pole is NOT a land mass. 

This is a fact that you should really share with your kiddo’s, because of the Polar Express ( a personal favorite) and other stories and cartoons, many children think that it is.

The North Pole is a definition of the latitude, which is 90 degrees north. That exact location will find you in the middle of the Arctic Ocean, so I don’t think there’s a floating post office out there.  There are ice flows though.

The most northerly piece of land on earth is Kaffeklubben Island, which according to Wikipedia is 83°40′N, 29°50′W, and is 707 kilometers (440 mi) from the geographic North Pole. I've included more information in the packet, and found some nice photography on YouTube from the weather cams at the North Pole. Click on the link to take the trip.

For the gingerbread address activity and number card fun, click on the link to view/download the Gingerbread Number Fun Packet.

This led to making gingerbread house groups/sets cards.  Cut them up and make into puzzles and Memory Match or "I Have; Who Has?" games. I've included counters for even more options. Click on the link to grab those to go along with the above packet.

I also made a Gingerbread House Slider.  Click on the link for this great whole-group assessing tool.  I've included upper & lowercase letter strips, numbers, shapes, + skip counting sliders for 2's, 3's, 5's, and 10's. 

Add pizzazz to your kiddo's houses with glitter glue, white puffy paint, or colored confetti.  I really like the candy-like look of the confetti. 

You can buy a bag at most party stores for less than $2. Stock up for next year after New Year's when bags are as much as 75% off.

To reinforce patterning, have students pick a pattern and then use a red and green marker to trace the numbers & letters.

TIPS: It's easier for them to trace BEFORE they cut their strips apart.  Putting a piece of Scotch tape on the back of seams also makes for smooth sliding. Click on the link to view/download the Gingerbread House Slider.

Finally, I had so much fun with the confetti, I thought of a gingerbread shape game.  Children pick a partner and take turns spinning, whatever shape they land on, they color that matching "window" on their gingerbread house. 

When they are done playing the game, decorate the roof tops with confetti.  For that added bit of pizzazz, have your students cut their door, so that it opens, and then glue a photo inside. 

I've also included a gingerbread man button matching game in this packet too.  Children play this shape game, by rolling a dice. When they are done, they draw a face on their gingerbread.  Click on the link for the Gingerbread Shapes Up Game.

Thanks for visiting.  It's time to go catch some snowflakes on my tongue, while I frolic as a child with my little grandson Kaiden.  Wishing you a fun-filled magical day. 

"The best way to spread Christmas cheer, is to sing loud for all to hear; and of course whipping up a batch of gingerbread to share." -Unknown

1-2-3 Come Make A "Gingerbag" With Me

The idea of using a brown paper bag for a gingerbread house did not originate with me.  I saw several PINS on Pinterest of completed bags, but no one had a template others could use, so I designed one. 

Having volunteered in my own children’s rooms when they made graham-cracker gingerbread houses that wouldn’t stay together, making the gooey mess rather frustrating,  I think the "gingerbag" is a nice alternative. 

However, if you still want to make a "real" gingerbread house click on the link for a great recipe for strong & quick-drying "frosting glue."

To make an easy gingerbag, run off the clip art pages on white construction paper.  (There are 4 pages of samples.) Students choose, color and cut out whatever pieces they want to glue to the “back” of their gingerbag.     

Face the bag towards you so that the bottom of the bag is at the top, and looks like a flap. 

This is the perfect place to glue the “candy roof.”  I drew several door, window and roof options.  Children arrange the pieces ‘til they are satisfied with the look, and then glue them down.  

White puffy paint, glitter glue, stickers, and a child's photo in the window, can all add pizzazz to their gingerbread homes.

I've also included an adjective writing prompt page where students describe their gingerbread house. (Great for Daily 5 Word Work.)

For a cute December bulletin board, cover the top of the board with blue foil wrapping paper for the “sky.”

Staple the “snow fabric” that people use for their Christmas villages, to the bottom of the board.  “Sprinkle” the houses on top.

Houses can stay flat, but look adorable lightly stuffed with tissue, so they are 3D and stand up.  You can also line them up on a window or chalkboard sill.

You can dangle a star from the ceiling and trim with real twinkle lights if a plug is nearby.  Caption: Mr(s.) _____________’s kindergartners (grade) are wishing you a sweet and cozy Christmas.

Click on the link to view/download "Gingerbag" the Lunch Bag Gingerbread House packet. 

If you're looking for even more gingerbread clip art to decorate things with, click on the link to take a look at one of my favorite artists, dj inkers. 

She has lots of adorable packs.  I used some in my sample gingerbag.  My 2 personal favorites are Build a Gingerbread and Gingerbread Mouse. 

Thanks for visiting. I'm in a super-crafty mood today, so I think I'll start on a sketch of my little grandson that I've been wanting to do. 

Maybe I'll get it done in time for a Christmas gift for my daughter. Wishing you a special day filled with relaxing moments.

1-2-3 Come Chase The Gingerbread Man With Me!

I LOVED designing this gingerbread writing and activity packet and am so excited to share it with you.  I hope you have oodles of fun with your kiddos doing these fun-filled activities. 

Before hand, put up the wanted posters in your room.  I've included 3, and think the one with the mustache is a hoot.

Run off the masters and put the notes, signs and clues in a variety of places in your school: cafeteria, library, office, gym etc.  Get your principal, secretary, cafeteria staff etc. in on your "ed-venture" and give them a clue card. 

After reading the original story of the gingerbread man, tell your students that you are going on an ed-venture looking for the gingerbread man, and to be on the lookout for clues of his where abouts.

Before hand, fill out the clue cards using plenty of spatial directions.  To get in some math practice, you may want your kiddos to count steps as they go.

The clue cards also come in black and white, but you may want to print everything in color, laminate, and then save for future years.

As you arrive at the various destinations, have adults at those places, say something like: "Oh no! You just missed him, but he left this clue!"  or "I think I spotted him over by that shelf."  (A clue card is on the shelf.)

After you make the rounds, return to your classroom to find a note on your door that the gingerbread man had been looking for them.  As a special surprise, while you are gone, have a helper set up gingerbread or cookie treats for your snack time. 

Now would be the perfect time to do the "Take a bite" graphing activity.  Children take one bite out of their cookie, and you graph what they bit off.  

I've also included a graph for "Who does or doesn't like the taste of gingerbread?"  Both of these graphs can be found in the Gingerbread Class Book packet. 

(Back to the original packet) I've included a class book where each student contributes a page, writing about the day's adventure.  

There are templates for students to do this separately or in groups. 

They can draw pictures or take a photograph. 

There's also a graphic organizer where students name their gingerbread man and describe him. 

Click on the link to view/download the Gingerbread On The Loose Writing and Activity packet.

Later today side note: Woo hoo!  I was surfing the net looking to see if anyone else did a gingerbread hunt and found a 1st-grade teacher (Jodi) who does this on the first day of school. She made adorable rhyming clue cards.  Click on the link to get her darling FREEBIE. (Fun In First.)

If you did the graphing activity, another fun transition would be to play a quick game of Pieces & Parts. Children color their gingerbread and then cut on the lines to make 6 puzzle pieces. 

Students pick a partner and take turns rolling the dice.  Whatever number they roll they glue that piece on their template.  The 1st one done is the winner.  Click on the link to view/download the Pieces and Parts Gingerbread Puzzle. 

Finally, another follow-up writing prompt I call "You're The Man!"  Your students pretend to become the gingerbread man. 

Where are they going? Why are they running?  What people/things are they running past? What finally happened to them?  I've included a fill-in-the-blank template for girls as well as boys to write on.

Encourage students to do a little research about their destination and include plenty of description in their sentences.  Have kiddo's underline adjectives when they do their rough draft, so they know if they have included enough. 

I filled in a sample to give you an idea of what I'm talking about. 

After students share their page, collect, collate and make them into a class book.  Click on the link to view/download the You're The Man! Gingerbread Writing Prompt craftivity.

Thanks for visiting today.  Feel free to PIN away.  If you'd like to see some of the creative and educational items I spend way too much time pinning, click on the link.  I have an entire board of gingerbread activities. 

Interesting bit of trivia:  "E. Cobham Brewer 1810–1897. Dictionary of Phrase and Fable. 1898.  Gingerbread Husbands: Gingerbread cakes fashioned like men and gilt, commonly sold at fairs up to the middle of the nineteenth century."

1-2-3 Come Do Some More Gingerbread Activities With Me

I LOVE drawing gingerbread boys and girls.  Each one has their own personality.  I try to give them that cuteness factor with special eyes and grins.  Since the "craftivities" I post are pretty popular, I decided to revamp a few favorites.

Gingerbread Cookie Counting now has a variety of traceable number sequences.  Choose one for your kiddo's to trace and write.  I've included counting to 20, counting backwards from 10 to 0 or 20 to 0 + skip counting by 2's, 3's, 5's, or 10's. 

Children cut and collate their little booklet and staple the edge.  Glue the last page on the box on the gingerbread's belly and you're all set.  Click on the link to view/download the Gingerbread Cookie Counting packet.

Look closely at the picture and you'll see that the cheek portion of the gingerbread is a pocket!  Students paint 2 paper plates brown.  When they are dry, cut one in half and staple it bottom-up, to the "face" of the gingerbread man to make a pocket. 

Children decorate their pocket to look like a gingerbread man's face, and fill with a variety of little accordion-folded books.  I up-dated this packet so that all of the booklets are now traceable. There are strips for counting to 36, skip counting by 2's, 3's 5's, and 10's.

I've also included templates for the hexagon, pentagon and octagon shapes.  Click on the link to view/download the Gingerbread Pocket Pal.

Every month I put up a new paper chain that contained a link for each day in the month.  I used it to review a variety of standards.  We'd count the links and subtract one by tearing it off; we'd identify the colors in English and Spanish and state what the pattern was. 

Children would count how many were left in English and then up to 10 in Spanish.  Students told me that the number of links was greater yesterday than they were today etc. 

As a great fine motor skill, I'd sometimes have my Y5's make their own paper chains.  They could take it home, hang it up and countdown the days to whatever special occassion was happening that month.  I designed the gingerbread paper chain with all of this in mind.  Click on the link to view/download it.

Another fun way to get some number recognition and counting sequences in, is to have students put together gingerbread 10-piece number-strip puzzles. There's one that counts to 10, another that counts backwards and finally one that counts by 10's. 

Print, laminate and trim and have students place the pieces on the numbered grid, or run off copies for everyone; they trim and then glue back together.  Click on the link to view/download the gingerbread puzzles. 

I made a gingerbread dice game with a 6-piece puzzle as well.  Students pick a partner and take turns rolling the dice.  Whatever number they roll, they place that numbered puzzle piece on the grid.  The first one to complete their puzzle is the winner.

I've also included a black and white set if you want to run off copies for all of your kiddo's.  They color and trim. 

They can either glue their rolled pieces to the grid, or place them on so that they can take their gingerbread puzzle home and play again. Click on the link to view/download the Gingerbread 6-Piece Puzzle packet.

I hope your students will also enjoy the Gingerbread Number Fun packet. This 33-page packet is chock full of all sorts of activities to help students recognize numbers; add and subtract; make groups and sets; show greater and less than; and count from any number.

I've included gingerbread number cards from 1 to 126, with a blank template for you to program with more.  There's also trace and write the number worksheets, "what's missing?" worksheets + skip counting activities by 2's, 3's, 5's, and 10's.  Skip counting bookmarks to use as rewards, are also included. Click on the link to view/download the Gingerbread Number Fun packet.

Finally, since the Clothespin Number Matching games have been so popular,  I decided to make some winter ones as well, and started with gingerbread.  Click on the link to view/download the Gingerbread Clothespin Number Matching Game.

Thanks for visiting today.  Feel free to PIN away.  If you'd like to take a look at the awesome educational things I spend way too much time pinning, click on the heart to the right of the article. 

I design and blog daily so I hope you can stop by tomorrow for the newest FREEBIES.

"Come sit at my table and share with me, warm gingerbread cookies and cinnamon tea." -Unknown

1-2-3 Come Do Some Gingerbread Activities With Me!

Gingerbread activites are like Pinterest; does anyone ever get enough?   My daughter frequently asked me why I "reinvented the wheel" each month, spending hours creating new things, when I already had "a ton." 

The easy answer was, I simply LOVE designing stuff!  I'm always looking to improve, as well as keep things current, fresh and interesting.  There must be quite a few teachers who feel the same, as I continue to get requests for "more-more-more" gingerbread goodies. 

I hope you enjoy the newest FREEBIES on the blog today, plus a few old favorites that you might not have been aware of. 

"I need a glyph!" is probably one of the most frequent e-mail requests that I get.  The gingerbread glyph is very popular.  Glyphs are a great way to get to know your kiddos, at the same time whole group assessing listening & following directions. 

Because each one is so different, they make a cute December bulletin board. If you'd like to see my entire glyph collection, click on the link to zip on over to the Glyph Section of my site. 

Many teachers are also in search of worksheets that help reinforce and review a variety of standards, so that they can use them for practice, whole-group assessing, games, something for "early finishers" to transition to, or homework.

With that in mind, I designed a variety of simple, quick and fun gingerbread-themed worksheets that I think your kiddo's will enjoy. 

Plug a few into your Daily 5 activities or sub folder.   Click on the link to view/download the Gingerbread Worksheet Packet.

One of the most popular stories read in December is The Gingerbread Man.  I enjoy collecting various versions, with different endings.  Introducing story elements by reading a favorite book, is a simple way to grab students' attention.  

Give them a list of things you want them to listen for,  then when they realize where the setting is, they shoot up their hand.  When a new character is introduced, they do it again etc.  This is fun for children and keeps them focussed.

You'll be able to cover quite a few Common Core Standards with The Gingerbread Literacy Packet.  I've included picture cards, a graphic organizer, and a story slider "craftivity"  to help students sequence and retell the story.

The slider is my personal favorite.  I updated this old favorite. Adding "frosting" with puffy paint gives it an "awwww-dorable" finishing touch.

There are also pocket cards, 40 traceable word cards as well as a Venn diagram activity.  Click on the link to view/download The Gingerbread Literacy Packet.

For more Gingerbread Venn diagrams, click on the link for some fun ways to compare and contrast a variety of things. 

The Gingerbread Sentence pack is also great for reviewing the story, as well as practicing end punctuation and capitalization. 

You can use the pocket chart cards for a whole group activity and correct the sentences together, or have students do the individual worksheet.

Click on the link to view/download the Gingerbread Punctuation Packet.

Finally, K-teacher Jill, from Georgia, asked if I had time to make some gingerbread activities that involved colors and color words.  I hope you like them too.  Click on the link to view download the Gingerbread Colors Packet.

Thanks for visiting today.  Feel free to PIN away. It's my hope that my efforts bring a smile to your students and more quiet time for you.  I enjoy hearing from my visitors; you can leave a comment below or e-mail me at: diane@teachwithme.com

"Had I but a penny in the world, thou shouldst have it for gingerbread." -William Shakespeare.

1-2-3 Count Gingerbread With Me!

"Run! Run; as fast as you can. Try and catch me! I'm the gingerbread man!"

In this sweet counting booklet, the gingerbread man is running past a number of Old Mac Donald's farm animals, as students count backwards from 10 to 0, making it a terrific booklet to practice "blasting off" counting.

This is also a fun way to review subtraction by taking away one and makes a nice independent math center.

Students are encouraged to make the animal sounds, the number of times that correspond to the matching number of animals that the gingerbread sees, which is a wonderful opportunity to introduce the word onomatopoeia to them.

You can finish up by reading the booklet as a whole group to reinforce concepts of print and then sing the song Old MacDonald as well.

Follow up your reading block by having your students crouch down and blast off to their seats to make one of the gingerbread manipulatives in the Arts and Activities packet.  If you do use this booklet for your reading block, it works well for a Daily 5 activity too.

Click on the link to view/download The Gingerbread and OldMacDonald Counting Booklet.  If you're looking for more Gingerbread Activities, simply click on the link to go to that section of my shopping cart.  Everything's FREE.

Do you have a gingerbread activity you could share with us?  I'd enjoy hearing from you. diane@teachwithme.com or post a comment here.

Thank you for visiting today.  Feel free to PIN anything you think others might find worthwhile.

"Make sure you choose your own path and stick to it." -Apples and Chalkdust

1-2-3 Come Make a Gingerbread Glyph With Me

I enjoyed making glyphs with my students each month. Glyphs are a pictorial form of data, also known as a pictograph.

They are an easy and interesting way to help reinforce listening and following directions and make a great display for a hallway.  My Y5’s enjoyed making them + they provided an opportunity to learn more about their classmates.

If listening and following directions, is a report card standard for you, glyphs are a wonderful whole group assessment tool for that.

Because of the variety of questions, you can also turn some of them into graphing extensions. i.e. Do you like gingerbread? Have you ever made Christmas cookies? etc.

Turning your students into glyph detectives is also a fun way for them to learn how to collect data and analyze results.

Give students 10 minutes to see how many gingerbread glyphs they can figure out. By using your personal glyph as an example, take a moment to explain how they would go about doing this.

When the glyphs are complete, number them, and display the gingerbread in the hallway. Write a list of student names at the top of a pre-numbered sheet of paper.

Give students 5-10 minutes in the hallway to try and figure out the gingerbread glyph mysteries.

When the timer rings, flip up the glyphs to read whose glyph it is, and have students self-correct their papers.

The person with the most correct, gets a gingerbread sticker or whatever you deem is appropriate.

I’ve included my purple gingerbread glyph as an example. The coloring didn’t come through the scanner as bright as I wanted it to.  Click on the link to view/print the Gingerbread Glyph

If you are looking for other glyphs, I have made one for each month. Click on the link to go to the glyph section.  Scroll down to view the examples and click on whatever else you want to download. 

Thank you for visiting today. Feel free to PIN anything you think others may find helpful.

Do you have a glyph you could share with us? I’d enjoy hearing from you.  diane@teachwithme.com or post a comment here.

“Little by little does the trick!” -Abraham Lincoln.