Easter Freebie: Bookmarks and Homework Passes

Second post of the day - I doubt you will mind though - it's a FREEBIE!

With my day at home, I am quickly trying to make sure everything is prepped for the end of this week, and finally go on our spring break!!!  The laminator is humming and I'm prepping these bookmarks for my school kiddos' Easter baskets.  Click on the image above to go and download. 

 What?  Easter baskets?  Yes, my school kiddos make up Easter baskets on the day before vacation.  It's a quick little art project, but they love it and I enjoy a place for them to store all their goodies.  By goodies I mean their Easter egg that has their name on it (they find their specific one during the Easter egg hunt), the cute bookmark, a Homework Pass, a brand new pencil, and some other odds and ends.   

How do they make up their Easter basket?  With just a plain paper bag.  That's it.  I then let them put a quarter piece of tissue paper inside to help fill it out a bit.  Then they decorate it.  This year I splurged on the foam egg stickers - usually they just color or trace a bunny on it.

Here are some pictures of how to create it, in case you are interested.

Step 1: Take a plain paper bag and cut an inch strip from the top going vertically down about halfway.

Step 2: Open up the bag and fold the outside parts down, leaving only the middle inch strip sticking up

Step 3: Staple (or tape) the strip together - creating a handle.

Step 4: Decorate! (My 6 year old did this project - can you tell?  He's a helper!)

Have a great day!

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Shamrock Art and Writing

I wanted my students to do a different type of brainstorm today before they dove into their quick write.  

The topic - "I'm Lucky Because..."
Not that I believe in luck, but I do believe that we are blessed....
So we made shamrocks for a quickie art project.  

Took a piece of green construction paper, folded in half vertically, folded in half again horizontally (fourths), then folded one more time to make eighths.  I told them where to hold when they cut, and some drew a half a heart as a little reminder as to where to cut.

They cut out 4 equal hearts (if they were paying attention), some ended up with 8 tiny little hearts - it still worked.
Then we glued it together to make a shamrock, using leftover scraps to make a stem.

This was their brainstorm tool.
One leaf was "I am lucky...", the other 3 were reasons WHY they were lucky.

After they wrote out their reasons we stuck them up on my rolling cabinet door for our little 4 leaf clover garden, and they wrote a quick paragraph with their reasons to stick up on our writing wall.
I LOVE how simple it was, and how it got the kids thinking as to why they are special.  
Hope you had a great day!

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St. Patty's Pins

One of my favorite boards on Pinterest is my Holidays in School board.  I stick anything related to a special day in that one place.  Yes, I know there isn't as many pins in that folder as some of the other boards, but those pins remind me to also have fun in the classroom.  You can probably relate... with all the curriculum, sometimes it's not fun to be a teacher all the time.
With any of the below images, just click the picture to take you to the pin.  You can then go onto the original website, or you can repin/like it. :)

I made these for my class last year.  Of course I used a sandwich bag, but the label was super cute (and free).  

These I Have, Who Has templates come in handy.  
I used these Would You Rather prompts for my journal writes last year during the week before St. Patrick's Day.

My class used this information last year to learn more about Ireland.

This costs some money, but is super cute.

Totally doing this one this year. 

Love the idea of this art project.
Linking up with Brenda from Primary Inspired for her Linky Party.
Hope this helped someone.  :)  Have a great day!

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Decorating for Easter/Spring

I love Easter.  I love spring, the pastel colors, the weather, and soon to be spring break....I love the real reason behind Easter.  I don't love the allergies that come along with it, but soon enough they will be conquered with my allergy meds.

 I picked up this yarn tree from Target.  It's in the Easter section.  I've been looking for a tree or branches or twigs since fall... but I couldn't find something that I loved... until now!

 

I have wanted to make one of those book trees for so long, but without the materials it stunk.  Because I want to change it out for the different seasons (see - the colors aren't totally pastel), for this month they are going to write their books on the outside of these plastic Easter eggs.  A little tape on a short piece of ribbon and voila!  I also picked up some $1 plastic buckets to store the eggs in.  One basket of eggs for books, another one to write student names on.
  

This is something super simple, but by now my kiddos are just about sick of seeing me reach for my cup of student numbers.  So, for this month I write their names on an egg and use a basket instead to draw names from.  At the end of the month, during our Easter party, we use the name eggs to have an Easter egg hunt in the classroom.  I hide them with a homework pass tucked inside, they find their own egg (it's a little more challenging then finding any random egg), and it's a little treat for them to add to their Easter baskets.    

Super cute - right?

I also prepped my Easter Egg banner to start using for this coming month.  I love using incentive banners in the classroom.  I started with them back in December, and since then it's been fun.  My kiddos have worked through Tara's Be Merry banner (December), my Snowman and Dream banners (January), and Love Bug (February).  Now it's Easter Egg time.  Little things in life, right?  Something so simple and my kids love to spell it out.  Spelling it out earns them a treat - just another little motivation tool.  I used to just put letters on the board to spell out a specific prize, but I like how flexible and cute the banners make my board look - as well as it's a reminder for the kiddos of what we are trying to spell.  

I've also been adding more things to my little stores.  

My newest little thing is a freebie writing pack for Easter.  

Same cute clipart as my Figurative Language Task Cards.  

I love this little chick and egg from MelonHeadz Illustrating.

Now - help me out a bit... I found these adorable containers at the Dollar Tree - bunnies, chicks, and carrots... but I have no clue what to put inside.  I want to do something regarding review for ELA and Math since that's what we will be doing this next month... but I just don't know what to fill them with.  Ideas anyone?  

Hope you had a great day! 

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Five on Friday!

Five for Friday! Today I'm linking up again with Doodlebugs Teaching to share my 5 random things from this week.

1. Birthday Party for Dr. Seuss

We celebrated today after we did our regular assessments. The kids wore their PJs, brought in their blankets, books, and pillows. They then set up shop and read. Sometimes by themselves, sometimes with a partner, sometimes full class. That was the morning, and this afternoon we watched a little movie complete with red fish and gummy eggs as a treat. This Readathon was also a technology fundraiser for my class. Here is the letter I sent home in case you are looking for ideas.

2. Figurative Language Rainbows

This week we continued on with figurative language, this time adding examples and color to a Figurative Language Rainbow. I am so proud of myself for figuring how to make a rainbow on PowerPoint.

3. Writing Writing Writing

The state writing assessment is next week and my students have been working hard on their paragraphs. I am so thankful that the Rainbow Edit is working for this group.  I think that alone has helped make them into better writers.  Now I don't have to remind them to include indents, capitals, punctuation, details, topic sentence, and spelling.  

4. Girl Scout Cookies

I want to personally thank the Girl Scouts at my school for providing ample opportunities to purchase boxes of cookies. I want to thank my husband for preferring a certain kind that I can't stand, and for being supportive in purchasing boxes for the cupboard and for the freezer.

5. Last but not least, I want to thank you for your support when I posted this picture on Facebook.

It was nice knowing it wasn't just my class that the moon affected this past week.

Hope you had a great week!

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Dr. Seuss' Birthday and Pins

This morning I woke in a panic.  I knew February was quickly flying by, but this morning it occurred to me that after February comes March, and that was next week!

So, instead of sleep I've been downstairs on the computer updating my Dr. Seuss activities for this year... you know, changing the date, etc...

Every year, for as many years as I can remember I've celebrated Dr. Seuss' birthday.  

When I taught Kindergarten I brought in eggs & food coloring and scrambled them.  The kids were grossed out every year.  This year I want to do this for my students.    

When I taught 2nd grade, the team would each choose their favorite Dr. Seuss read aloud and we rotated rooms to share with the other classes.  The kids really enjoyed that - having the teachers switch around instead of them moving.  

In 4th grade I still celebrate.  I give Dr. Seuss credit for helping teach my students to read.  So I give my students an invitation to attend a Read In.  Pillows, Blankets, Books, PJ's... it's a full invitation just like a party.  I also use this Read In for another fundraiser for my classroom and turn it into a Read-a-thon for technology.  Last year we raised enough for a Kindle Fire and a NowBoard.  This year I'm hoping for more MP3 players and another Kindle Fire.    

I also bring in a couple of Dr. Seuss books (and ask my students to bring in their favorites), and we make up a figurative language book like the below picture.  It's not my picture, but it's the same idea.  I give them the outline of a Dr. Seuss hat and they cut it out on top of another piece of copy paper.  We then staple the 2 papers together, one staple in each section of the hat.  They then cut the top paper on the specific lines so it's becomes flippable.  They write the titles to the different sections out just like below, and then we dive into our books to then write examples under each section.  Just another way to practice Figurative Language.    

How do you celebrate?  

Linking up with Learning in Wonderland Pinspired Linky.

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