Chicka Chicka Boom Boom

Although I am now about a month into the new school year, I know that for many {primary} teachers Chicka Chicka Boom Boom is a favorite for beginning the school year.  If it's not too late...check out these great finds!
From I Heart Crafty Things, start off with this cookie sheet/magnet board of ABC's

 and finish things off with this coconut treat snack.  OH MY!

From Peace, Love and Learning, a FREE counting game download!

The Crafting Chicks shows you how to create your own mini coconut trees using toilet paper rolls, a leaf pattern and foam letters.

oh...and another idea for a snack to follow the book.

Read Together Create Together has this idea for an art project.

Kinder By Kim has the following idea, which I could see using as part of a call book or bulletin board.  What a fun name and letter idea!

This bulletin board idea from Mrs. Jump's Kindergarten Class

Mama Dani's Musings came up with this lapbook for the book.

Along with this art project using an arm for the trunk of the tree, hand prints for the palm leaves, thumb prints for the coconuts and stamps for the letters.

Mama Dani's Musings recently added some ideas for Chicka Chicka Boom Boom 123.

Check out this writing area...using the coconut tree and letter recognition.  I love the lights, unfortunately I don't think I would be allowed to do something like that at my school though.  This picture was sent to me from a reader {Monica}, a pre-k teacher.  Love it!

First Day of School Activities

This one is for the teachers out there...
I have found some really fun 1st of the school year ideas that I thought I would share.
Brown Bear, Brown Bear What do you See? is one of those great early reader books that uses repetition to teach reading skills.  Melissa from F is for First Grade, created a free downloadable version of First Graders, First Graders, What do you see?  Such a super name/getting to know you activity!  Totally using it!

Mrs. Mac @ First Class with Mrs. Mac created the original version of this book adaptation and you can print hers too!  Love it!

If you aren't a 1st grade teacher, and reading this, you might be able to find a version that would work for your grade level.  If not, this gives you the idea to create your own!

Twisty Noodle has a variety of great coloring pages for the first day of school.  These are great to have on the students' desks as they come in to class that first day!

Need a printable alphabet chart?  No problem, Judy @ KinderTastic has you taken care of!

I LOVE this name recognition activity...again geared towards the younger kids.  Have your student write their name with a white crayon on a white sheet of construction paper.  Then have the kids watercolor over the "invisible" name and watch it appear!  This idea was seen at Dresses N Messes.

Babbling Abby has a fun name idea too!  Man!  I love her site...so fun to read!

For older grades, HERE is a great venn diagram the students can use to compare and contrast their summer to another student's summer vacation.

or HERE for a printable Back to School BINGO.

I could see the following form used to decorate a bulletin board.  Have the students fill out this Guess Who I Am form.  As the teacher, tape a piece of black construction paper to a wall and using an overhead projector, trace each student's profile.  Have them cut out what you have traced and mount the black profile picture onto a different color of construction paper to make it stand out.  Attach the form to the profile picture and walaa!

 Something that I did last year in my class (that I will continue to do) is with my pirate themed class, we go on a treasure hunt.  Really, this is my way of giving the students a tour of the school, but it adds a little spice.  First I read a pirate story (any will do).  During lunch is when I set things up because it gives me time to get things ready and by then the kids really aren't expecting anything.  When the students come back to class after lunch, I tell them I found an envelope on my desk addressed to the class.  Basically it is a typed up note from a pirate named Boris, who tells us he has left treasure in the school for us, but that we have to go find it.  I have notes/clues taped up around the school (that I pray an older grade student doesn't move during lunch!) and we walk around as a class following the clues until we find the treasure.  I have a treasure chest waiting at the end of the hunt filled with a treasure of some sort for each student. Last year the treasure was some pirate fruit snacks and pirate silly bands.  This year though I found these great little pirate zip lock bags in the dollar bins at Target.  I plan to fill enough bags with some kind of treasure.  I was thinking chocolate coins, plastic money, (gold foil wrapped) Rolos or something else piratey (yes, I just made up that word!)

What ideas do you have for the 1st day or week of school??

The Letter "O" Activities

I have been thinking a lot lately about how I need to be doing more activities with my younger kids to get my 4 year old ready for preschool next year.  I have been looking for ideas on the internet to see what there is, and I have come up with some activities soon to come.  The activities will probably be random...ranging from letters of the alphabet to numbers to shapes and so on. 
Today I started with the letter "O".  I printed off this "O" worksheet from HERE.

I talked to my kids about the short o sound and talked about the 4 pictures from the bottom of the page.  The kids then colored the pictures, cut out the squares (with help from me) and glued them to a piece of paper.  Then they practiced writing the letter "O".

Next we made our snack.  We had octopus (using hotdogs and spaghetti noodles).  This is the before: 

I cut a couple hotdogs into 1/3 pieces and then broke a handful of uncooked spaghetti noodles in half.  First I talked to the kids about how many legs people have, then how many legs dogs have and then we talked about how octopuses have 8 legs.  I gave my kids the noodles and let them slide the noodles through the hotdog slices. 

Then they helped me drop the octopus into the water (just like where they live!)  After about 10 minutes, we had our snack of octopus and orange juice served in an orange cup.  I personally wasn't tempted to dive into today's snack, but my kids sure thought it was yummy.  If only I could make vegetables look as fun! 

(I saw the octopus idea at Plum Pudding.)
I ended our "O" day by reading the book The Great Swimming Race (By:  Ann Bryant and Peter Kavanagh)  I wanted to read a fun children's book about an octopus and this is what I could find at my local library.  It was an easy read, but after a busy afternoon my kids didn't seem to mind. 

The kids were really entertained and loved all the activities!  I can't wait to do more fun things like this with them!!

Some More O Ideas:
Art Project:
Make an octopus - Cover a small styrofoam ball with cloth and tie it with enough ribbons to make eight legs.

Sport/Game:
Build a simple obstacle course for your child to play on. Another game to play could be to help your child think of opposites. You say the word "off" and your child must reply with "on".

Math:
Octagon - point out the shape in everyday objects such as a stop sign. Draw and color one.

ABC & 123 also has some great finds for the letter "O".

Find Your Heart Mate

Supplies:
Construction paper hearts
Scissors

How To Play: Cut hearts in half either in different angles, or with decorative large cutting scissors. Hand out the hearts and have the children find their heart-mate!

I have used this game before, but added some learning to the game as well. Here are some other ideas:
* On one half of the heart write a math problem, and the match is the answer to the problem.
* Uppercase letter with lower case letter
* Synonyms
* Antonyms
* Same shape or color as a match (preschool/kindergarten age)

Really the possibilities for this game are endless! Get creative!!

Some Random Ideas

Can you believe it? I have already started to see Valentine ideas floating around the internet and the decorations up in the stores! It seems too soon to be focusing on Valentine's already (especially since my Christmas tree just barely came down), so I will be collecting ideas, but not sharing them for a couple more weeks. For now, I am going to take a break from the holiday posts and share some other ideas I have been hanging on to. My thoughts might be random, but I have to get these things posted...

My kids started back to school today, so the homework is sure to follow! Here is a site with at least 25 ways to practice your spelling words in a fun, new way!

Since it is a new year, this is the time for setting new goals (and hopefully keep them!) If you would like a way to get conversation going around the dinner table, try out these conversation pebbles from I am a craft addict.

I love these pretend checks from 733! These could be used for play time (dress ups, etc.) or as a tool for math homework.

Oh and one more random thought for the day. Check out these weather magnets you could make for your kids (from it's a daisy day). Perfect for preschool/kindergarten age kids who learn about the weather!

Memory Game From Recycled Lids

I just found the best idea for recycling those Gatorade bottle lids. Check out what My Little Gems decided to make as a fun and cheap Halloween game. I know Halloween is over, but I thought I would share anyway so that you can keep the idea in mind for next year. Besides, the concept could work for any occasion or holiday. Just change up the stickers! You could even place letter stickers underneath and have the kids match upper case letters to lower case letters. The possibilities are almost endless.

Kool Aid Play Dough

Today it is snowing for the 2nd day in a row. You would think that since I have lived in cold, snowy places before I would be use to it by now. The truth is, I probably would be if I had lived in the snow more recently. For the past 9 years, up until this last summer when our family moved, I have been living in almost 365 days a year of pure warmth and sunshine. I will get use to the change in weather, but for now I am going stir crazy.
I decided to try out THIS recipe for Kool Aid Play Dough. (I am sure there are TONS of these recipes out there, but this is the one I decided to try. It was super easy and super fast! It is suppose to smell good too, but I can't really smell too much from it. (I used pink lemonade kool aid though so maybe pick a more potent smell.) It turns out really soft too and my 2 little kiddos are having a blast playing. YEAH~no fighting! Anyway, if you too are longing for warmer outside days and looking for something to do (indoors) try out this recipe.
From a teaching stand point, you could turn this into an educational tool too. Try having your kids make letters or words with the play dough.

Also, if you have cookie cutters, you could have the kids cut out shapes and name them for you. (My 3 1/2 year old is having fun making triangles and telling me all about them.)

You could also try doing a little math. Make numerals or try story problems such as rolling out 4 balls/snakes/whatever and take away one. What are you left with? 3! You can even have your child practice counting the objects you/your child makes.

Handwriting Help

Looking for a way to help your kid(s) with their handwriting? This site allows you to type in the words that you want your child to practice, up to 10 words. You can also choose between print and cursive, the size of font and how you want the lines the words are on to look. How cool is that? Anyway, thought I would share.

What To Do With Those Plastic Easter Eggs

I was trying to think up some ideas of ways you could use plastic Easter eggs in an educational way. After Easter, it seems that those eggs get stored away until the following year when they can again be used for another egg hunt. Well here are some ideas I came up with. If you are a teacher, I was thinking that some of these ideas could be used as centers.

Fill an Easter basket with an assortment of eggs split apart. The students have to find the correct match up, connect the egg and place the complete egg in an egg carton. If you are trying this activity on older kids, try to mix up the colors so the answer isn't so easy to find. (Like a pink top with a green bottom.)
Math problem to answer match up - Write the problem on one half of the egg and the answer on the other half. Depending on the age level of the kids, you could do anything from simple addition to division.
Upper and Lower Case Match Up - Find an upper case letter and its matching lower case letter and connect the eggs.
Cursive to Print - Have the kids try to match up the correct cursive letter to the same letter in print. The could be a good activity when just introducing cursive, especially since cursive can feel like a whole new language to kids! :)
Dots to Numeral - For younger kids, have the them match up the number of dots on half the egg, with the correct numeral on the other half. (four dots = 4)
Numeral to Number Word - Four to 4
Word to Definition - This could be applied to spelling, vocabulary lesson, etc. On this particular activity, have the eggs whole and have the students place the correct definition to the word (typed out on a piece of paper by you) in an egg with the correct word.
If you have any suggestions that could go along with this, or other ideas for reusing those plastic Easter eggs, I would love to know what you are thinking!

Easter File Folder Games

Here are some egg patterns ready to use for file folder games, memory, matching, etc.
This one deals with matching the correct numerals to the number of dots.
Click HERE for the full 5 page print out available for this number game.


This is an alphabet activity where the child has to match the correct upper case letter to the lower case letter.


And finally...here is a file folder game where you try to match the same color of bunny to the Easter basket. I thought these 3 games might be fun to use for younger children around Easter time. I found these activities at A Child's Place under the section Free Printables on the sidebar.