Counting To 100-Day Continues...
Here are ideas 3 and 4
Drop something into a jar!
100-Day Jar:
Add A Piece To A Puzzle Each Day!
100-Day Puzzle:
One of the things I work on during the summer is getting my things ready for counting up to 100-Day. I’ve listed some of the “stuff” that I do. I hope you get a few ideas for your students and become excited for back-to-school.
I’m endeavoring to keep my articles short, so I will post only two ideas on a page. There are 6 ideas, so keep scrolling down for two more “mini-sub articles” if you want to read all of the tips for this topic!
Index Card Booklet:
Sammy Snake:
We’re “Pear Pairs!"
In the above article, I wrote a blog about fun and fair ways to pick partners.
I was diddling with homonyms and fooling around with the word pear and pair and thought making pears as puzzles would also be a fun way to pick a partner.
A bunch of alphabet, shape and number pears later, I had a 48-page packet! Click on the link to view/download Pear Pair Puzzles
This packet will be free for an entire year, then it will be updated and put in Diane's Dollar Deals in my TpT shop. Click on the link to pop on over.
Here's What To Do:
Run off the pears on yellow or green construction paper. Laminate the sheets.
Learning To Count By 5’s And Counting Up To 100-Day
Via a Fun And Interactive Bulletin Board for a Great First Day of School Activity!
I only had to skip count by 10’s to 100 with my Y5’s as a report card standard, but I know this is a standard for K’s and first grade.
A fun way to do this everyday as well as to count up to 100 for that special day, is to make this quick and easy bulletin board.
Here’s How:
"A Pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity. An optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty." - Unknown"
e.com"I am not a teacher, but an awakener." -Robert Frost
Are you trying to think of something different to do as an icebreaker for a fun first day of school activity? How about a survey?
My Y5’s loved carrying around a clipboard and asking questions. It makes them feel “grown up” and important, or so they tell me when I ask them why everyone always wants to use my clipboards.
You can buy packs of 12 at Sam’s Club for a reasonable price. They came in handy for this purpose as well as having them write in the hallway when we went on measurement adventures, or outside when we went on scientific explorations to collect data.
They are great as lapboards for when I had students writing in a circle on the floor as well, so I certainly got my money’s worth!
Directions:
This information can be found in my Back To School Packet. Click on the link to view/download it.
Until next time… have fun breaking that ice, making friends and melting hearts!
Thanks for visiting. I hope you can pop back tomorrow for more back to school tips.
Feel free to PIN anything you feel others might find helpful.
"No dreamer is ever too small; no dream is ever too big." -anonymous
Fun and Fair Ways To Pick A Partner
When it comes to children choosing a partner they sometimes find it hard to make a decision, because they are bombarded with “Pick me, pick me!” as many friends start asking to be their partner.
Other children feel left out because no one wants to be their partner, still others continue to choose the same child to work with ALL of the time.
I try to mix things up and make things fun and fair, with no hurt feelings, by having students pick a partner in a variety of enjoyable, sometimes themed-ways, that often carry an educational purpose with them as well.
Here are some of my favorite tips:
It's Partner Time! Make this unique clock:
I hope you found some ideas here of how to make choosing a partner more fun and certainly more fair. (Hopefully “Partners Without Tears!”)
Feel free to PIN anything you think others may find helpful.
As always, if you have an enjoyable tip of how your students accomplish this task, I’d enjoy hearing from you. diane@teachwithme.com
I hope you can pop back tomorrow for more back to school teaching tips. Scroll down for another picking partners idea: Pairing Pears!
"Example moves the world more than doctrine." -Henry Miller
A Cookie Glyph As A Fun Way To Get To Know Your New Students!
Cookie Glyph:
I dreamed this up because I thought it would not only be a fun icebreaker, but it would make an instant and really cute bulletin board as well.
You can do these with your students the first week of school as a get-to-know-you activity, or you can tuck the directions and a tan construction paper cookie into your Open House Packet for parents to help their child with, and then they can bring their cookie on the first day of school for them to hold up and share with their new friends.
We have our Open House before school starts. If you don't, you can tuck it into your "Welcome to my class" letter / school packet that many teachers send out during the summer or simply send it home the first day of school.
Use my pattern, or revamp it to make it simpler or a bit more involved to fit the age of your students or the time frame you have allotted to complete it in class.
Take a photo of each student on their 1st day of school. I use this photo in all sorts of keepsake things during September until I get their school pix back.
I make black & white copies on the photo setting of our copier and keep them handy, along with other photos that I take in a file folder on my desk.
Click on the link to view/print everything you need to do this back-to-school cookie glyph.
Thank you for visiting today. Feel free to PIN anything you think others might find helpful.
I hope you can pop in tomorrow for another back-to-school idea.
"Reflect upon your present blessings of which every man has many; not on your past misfortunes of which all men have some." -Charles Dickens
I've Got A Little Light And I'm Gonna Let It Shine!
Do you study fireflies? I think you'll enjoy the following activities!
Click on the link to view/download the entire Firefly Packet or click on the separate links below.
Almost every night that my husband Daniel and I are out walking with our puppy, Chloe, we are amazed at the “dance of the fireflies”.
As a child I enjoyed catching “lightning” in a jar and then letting these amazing insects go before they died. I was simply fascinated at their ability to illuminate.
Firefly Art:1. Print off my “You light up my life with LOVE.” bookmark, color it and leave it in a special place for that special someone to find. Click on the link to view/print the firefly bookmark.
2. Run off copies of my wax paper winged firefly. Students cut out their brown firefly and glue a yellow "glow" tip to the end. Add wiggle eyes with glue dots. Cut a black pipe cleaner in 1/2. Make it into a V. Scotch tape the V to the back of the firefly. Curl each end around a pen to make antennae. Accordion fold an 11x5 sheet of wax paper, round the edges, fold in the middle and staple to the center of the firefly. Cute as is, or hot glue to a clothespin.
Click on the link to view/print wax paper-winged firefly.
3. Buy a package of Popsicle sticks that look like ice cream spoons. Paint the rounded side with neon yellow paint and then a coat of glow-in-the-dark paint. Paint the upper part light brown.
Add wiggle eyes and tissue paper wings. If you twist a ½ piece of pipe cleaner around the middle and make it into a ring, you’ve just made yourself a finger puppet; or hot glue a clothespin to the back, add a magnet and hang on your refrigerator to leave love notes to light up someone’s life!
4. Print off my template and make a firefly keepsake jar by dipping your index finger in bright yellow paint, and then making firefly bodies by pressing your fingerprint all over your bug jar.
Let the prints dry and then brush on glow-in-the-dark paint with a Q-tip. Add wings with a white pencil or crayon. Put an aluminum foil lid on the top and you have “lightning in a jar!”
Click on the link to view/print the firefly keepsake jar templates.
This is a great activity to do after reading 10 Flashing Fireflies. I only put 7 fireflies in this blue Ball Jar, but if you do this as a follow up to that story, have children do 10 fingerprint fireflies.
5. Cut 5x7 rectangles of yellow construction paper. Cut out the template of my firefly out of cardstock and trace around it with a yellow crayon on the yellow construction paper. Place a Dixie cup of diluted black tempera paint in the middle of the table. You should have enough tempera so that the paper will get covered, but enough water so that the water-paint mixture will bead up on the waxed crayon and reveal the firefly and not paint opaquely over it.
Have children “wash” paint over their entire middle of their paper.
I do this activity after I read Eric Carles’ book The Very Lonely Firefly. I tell my students: “OK let’s go find some more firefly friends for this firefly.” I ask them: “When do fireflies come out?” They respond: “At night.” So I tell them: “The sun is shining on this paper. It is bright yellow. You have to make night come by painting it black, so that the fireflies will come out.”
They are amazed to see their firefly appear!
6. For an adorable firefly bulletin board done with Christmas lights click on the link.
Firefly Language Arts Activities:
Firefly Bibliography: "What do we see in the summer night? Ten flashing fireflies burning bright!" Click on the link to view/print other firefly books that I recommend. I've highlighted in yellow my favorites. Click on the link to view/print a copy of my firefly bibliography.
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123 Count Fireflies With Me: Read, trace, write, count, and then cut and glue the group of fireflies to the matching numbered boxes. Have students use a yellow bingo dot marker to fill in the appropriate amount of dots in the squares.
For an easy reader counting booklet click on the link. Firefly counting booklet.
Don’t be “bugged” by the –ight words! Get a jump-start for fall and study them with my cute lightning bug flashcards. Click on the link to view/print them. Make the cards even more fun, by painting the letters with glow-in-the-dark paint! Firefly flashcards
Click on the link to view/print a firefly fan book of trace and write the firefly vocabulary words & a firefly life cycle fan book. Firefly Fan Books
Cut out the strips, punch a hole in the middle of the bottom. Put the pages together with a brass brad so they unfold like a fan and you have a cute way to review words and science!
Click on the link to TRACE and put the -ight words in ABC order. Firefly skill sheet.
Print off my lightning bug silly story poem, hang it in your room, turn off the lights and pretend you’re a lightning bug and read it in the dark by pointing at each word with a flashlight. Firefly story poem + notes home.
Click on the link to make a firefly class book.
Click on the link for my firefly prose poem. For another cute lightning bug poem click on the link.
Math Practice:
If you’re teaching summer school and doing fireflies with your students, or home schooling, clink on the link to view/print a firefly graph.
123-Count fireflies with me skill sheet. Click on the link to view/print firefly counting skillsheets + an addition subtraction skill sheet.
For a firefly life cycle wheel, click on the link.
For a fact sheet on fireflies and a firefly to label and color, click on the link. Firefly stuff
For a "bright student" firefly certificate of praise, click on the link.
For some awesome firefly photographs of real fireflies, click on the link.
I hope you enjoy these fun firefly activities, and I hope you get to see some real fireflies this summer!
As always, if you have a firefly activity you do with your children, I’d enjoy hearing from you. diane@teachwithme.com
Feel free to PIN anything you feel might help or interest others.
Until next time try saying this tongue twister: Fifty-four fireflies friskily flitted frantically from the frog’s ferocious feast!
Getting-To-Know-You Via A Glyph! A Fun Icebreaker For Back-To-School!
During the first few weeks of school, I always tried to plug in quick, easy and fun little ways for my students to get to know their classmates. I felt it helped build community and a caring classroom. It's amazing the diversity we have in our schools today!
Even if you homeschool, this is an interesting activity to do with your kiddos. I'm always surprised at the answers my own children come up with when we're playing games or chatting. Just when I think I really know their tastes and what not, they toss me a curve.
A really fun way to get to know your students is via a Bio-glyph.
This is simply a glyph about oneself, and a great way to learn all sorts of information.
Completed projects make an awesome bulletin board or hallway display.
Here's how: Run off a copy of my masters. The girls will need an oval head, the boys a circle.
I've found that by providing a template for students to follow, things are easier. Little ones tend to draw small and write big ( Go figure...)
When everyone has the appropriate template, read each direction slowly, and then repeat once. Remind your students to listen carefully. Because this is a listening and following directions activity, glyphs provide "proof" that a child is or isn't doing that.
Draw the “kinds” of hair, noses, eyebrows, mouths, ears, and cheeks, on your white board as you read the directions for each one. This will help students know what the various shapes look like, or how curly hair can be drawn.
If you are doing this with older students who can read, simply run off a copy of my master glyph (it provides samples) and pass it out to them. You can also revamp my glyph to make this easier and simpler to fit the age of your students or the time that you have allowed.
Make sure you do one for yourself so that you have an example. I did one for me and one for my husband. He's a wonderful guinnea pig and good sport, who is great for bouncing ideas off of.
As a fun extension, you can number and post the completed bio-glyphs, along with the key, in the hallway so that they flip up. Have students write their names on the BACK of their glyph in such a way, so that when a person flips them up, they can read their name.
Later, for added fun, put a real photograph (1st day of school picture) of the student on the wall, under the glyph. You could also have children become detectives and turn this into a "solve the bio-glyph mystery game."
Set a timer. Give students a certain amount of time to ask questions of their new friends, to help them try and figure out which bio-glyph belongs to whom. They can write down their answers on the "Whose Glyph?" sheet provided.
Which person got the most correct? ( I've included a super-sleuth certificate you can give them.) How did you do? This is a fun way for students to learn about each other and a great ice breaker for back to school.
Or… you can simply have each child come up and share their bio-glyph with the class by explaining it. Click on the link to view/download the Bio-Glyph Packet.
Thanks for visiting. If you're looking for more glyphs, click on the link to pop over to that section of my site. I tried to dream up one for all of the seasons. The Cookie Glyph and Apple Glyph are great for September.
"The sure way to teach easily and successfully, is to awaken interest and kindle enthusiasm." -Tyron Edwards