The TRUTH about George Washington!

 

Brand new, on SALE, and just in time for President's Day!  

The perfect president's day activity... actually, TWO activities! Choose one or both!

Each child can create their own fact-filled cherries that can be displayed individually.

 

OR 

You can make a class book (shaped like a cherry!) filled with facts and illustrations about George Washington's life.  My kiddos did these pages today and they really impressed me with how awesome some of their drawings were!

This packet includes things to do and discuss before you do the project (like telling the story of the cherry tree!), title and picture of George for the cover of either project, blank cherries if you want kids to write their own facts and 27 ready-to-go REALLY INTERESTING, true facts about George Washington, and of course- detailed directions for how to do each project.

Besides everything contained in this packet, all you need is a little construction paper and you've created a really cool informational project (or 2) about our nation's 1st President!

So many options! Something for everyone! Happy President's Day! Thanks for stopping by!
 

The Important Book Project

Have you heard of The Important Book by Margaret Wise Brown?  It's super duper old and classic.  If you've never seen it or don't have it, I found the whole book online HERE.

It's especially cool though because of the pattern each page of the book follows.  It takes a regular thing (like a spoon, the wind, grass, a daisy) and tells the most important thing about it (in the author's opinion), then goes on to list 3 more great details, but comes back to re-state the most important thing.

SO how can you use this in your class?  How cool would it be to have kids write about "The Most Important Thing About Me!"  or "The Most Important Thing About My Family!"

These could be done at ANY time of year (beginning of the year, open house, graduation, just a regular ol day), and you could hang them up or make a class book or ??? but I think the family idea could also make a sweet holiday gift- Christmas or even Valentine's Day since it's all about LOVE... and who do our kids love more than their families?!  :)  So that was why I whipped this project out right now.  They're going to be Valentine's gifts for the parents.  Man, if my kids made something this cute, I'd definitely keep it forever!  I love kid-drawn family photos.  That has TREASURE written all over it.  :)

Want to grab the writing and drawing papers on sale?  Head on over to my TpT store and snatch em up cheap and have fun doing this project tomorrow!  I have several options for writing papers and drawing papers so you can have them all and choose the one you like best.

Check them out!  I was dying reading some of the sweet, funny things they said.  And didn't they do a good job with their family portraits?  I taught them how to fit everyone in by doing a little overlapping if necessary.  Anyway- here!  I'll pick out a few of the highlights:

I love this line:  "It's true that we are: BFF."

The most important thing about my family is that we: love each other!

It's true that we are: perfect!

oh my gosh, can you see this one??  How do you spell TV?  :)
We like to: wach tefe
too cute!

And it's true that this family is: smrt (with a backwards "s" and all!)  :)

Don't you think parents will love these forever?  oh my!  SO great!!

  

When I am 100 Years Old!

I am in LOVE with this project!
 
I just did it for the 13th year in a row in honor of the 100th day of school, and let me tell you- it never gets old!  Ha!  Even if your 100th day is a little bit past, you should still do it!  It's so fun!

And I promise you, everyone who walks through your hall and sees them is sure to comment on how hilarious they are.  At one of my old, old schools we had a very strict kind of mean-ish Principal who never filed or liked ANYTHING, but guess what?  She was freaking out, taking pictures of these and talking about them for months.  There is something about this project that is just THAT great.  :)

If you like it and wanna give it a whirl, grab all the instructions, brainstorming tools, and writing paper choices in my TpT shop for only a few bucks!  I used to just have my Kindergarteners write a few lines about being 100... but this year I tried a writing frame and I'm really happy with the results (you get both options and more in my packet)!

And for now, just sit back and gets  kick out of these funny, sweet 100 year old babes:  Oh, and if you don't read Kindergarten writing, I will translate for ya!

This little lady is going to probably eat lots of salad, live in her apartment and spend time with her grandchildren.  For fun, she'll go bowling with her old friends and she'll also wear glasses.

This granny likes to "jric cofe"  (drink coffee). :)

Eating lots of jello and relaxing in Arizona!

Playing BINGO and walking around with her cane.  Life is good! 

And when this little guy gets together with his friends, they're not doing anything wild and crazy.  They're just gonna "go ras"  (go rest).  Sounds good, buddy!

Let it Snow, Let it Snow, Let it Snow!

I live in the frigid Midwest and honestly, winter is a little too long and gloomy for me.  BUT, what can ya do?  Can't change the weather, but... you CAN make bright wintry art projects to brighten up the halls!  :)  It helps the Winter go by a tiny bit faster.
Speaking of- I just found out that Groundhog's Day is on February 2 because it's the exact half-way mark between the Winter Solstice and Spring Equinox!  Who knew?  We're half way done with winter!  Bring on the Spring, baby!
So anyway, I found this art project somewhere on the Internet years ago... sorry, don't recall where, but I wanted to share it with everyone because it's so simple and cheery!

You could skip this beginning part, but we started by studying snowflakes and reading the story Snowflake Bentley.  He was a real person long ago who showed awesome perseverance and courage working to take photographs of snowflakes: "his gift to the world!"  Aren't they beautiful?!  It fascinates me how unique and intricate they are, yet so tiny and temporary.

 

So then we talk about how to draw snowflakes... all the different ways they can look, yet they have the basic 6-pointed shape.  I give them several examples of simple ways to draw different kinds.

Then, they get a paper that has 9 really faint circles on it.  Inside each circle, they use a white crayon to draw a snowflake.  Make sure they press hard (I wish I had told my class to press harder). You can find this paper for FREE on my TpT store!

Then get out the watercolors.  I modeled this ahead of time for the kids so they knew all the steps they'd be doing and I LOVE this part because they FREAKED OUT!  You paint over the circle with a bright color of paint.  The white crayon resists the color to make the snowflake appear!  Magic!

Finally I matted them on colorful paper and hung them up to display!  

Here are a few examples of their work:

 

 
 

 

Until Spring comes... let it snow! :)

  

Let it Snow!

This art project is fun, beautiful and perfect for brightening up these grey winter days!! Do you love it?! I stumbled upon it via Pinterest right here... if you like it, go there for all the instructions! She describes it really simply. All the steps take about 20 minutes each day for 3 days (because you have to wait for stuff to dry).

I also loved how they all turn out so uniquely beautiful... here is a little clip of my class' work!
 

 We matted these on black, popped them into big decorated envelopes and gave them to parents as gifts before Christmas! I think this project would be gorgeous hanging in the hall, from the ceiling, or anywhere around your classroom! Just had to share how much I loved it!

Happy New Year!!

Just wanted to share this sweet little New Year's activity my class did this week!  I cut the heads, hats, party blowers, and shirts out for them ahead of time and let them just select the ones that fits them best.

They had to glue it all together, add their face, curl their party blower, and add the bling (one of our first experiences with bottle glue... ooooh, my.... just confirmed we're glue stick kind of people!) :).



 We talked about resolutions, which is kind of a hard concept for the littlest kids to understand.  This sound clip is kind of funny cause you can see some of them totally get it... and others, well, not so much... bless their little Kindergarten hearts.  :)  So sweet, I love them.
(btw, forgive me for being a little sloppy on the recording-- my 1st time using garage band on the iPad!  eek!)
But, if you're a teacher talking about resolutions, YOU could use this in your class to give your kiddos an idea about what a real resolution sounds like (and which ones could maybe use a little tweaking).



And then of course we did some writing!



Btw, these writing papers (in 12 different varieties so you can choose the best one or two that's BEST for YOUR class!) are available on my TpT store (and you can also buy them bundled with some "What I did over Winter Break" writing papers if you wanna go crazy and get all that classic back to school after break writing done in one simple shopping trip!)  :)

 Blessings on your 2013!!! Thanks for stopping by!