It's About Time, Teachers!

Saturday, February 18, 2023

IT'S ABOUT TIME for IDIOMS!

Idioms are phrases that have meanings quite different from the individual words. Understanding the figurative meaning of idioms is essential to fluent speaking, reading, and writing. And, thus, they are particularly problematic to English Language Learners. Even native speakers may struggle with the non-literal meaning of idioms. Hence, it's important to include idiom instruction in your curricula.

Research tells us that optimal instruction for students includes these tenets:

choose a theme
engage learners in discovery
reinforce with games
discuss specific idioms
combine idioms with pictures

Now you just need teaching materials. That's a piece of cake with these resources. Thematic and formatted similarly, each offers:

card sets that illustrate the literal meaning
and give the figurative meaning
instructions for 4 games
Scoot grid master
digital activity on TPT Easel

The last 5 units are available in a money saving bundle.

All of the above resources are CCSS aligned for grades 3-5.

These 2 units are FREE! They allow your learners to display their creativity as they make the illustrations of the literal meanings.

Thursday, February 9, 2023

It's About Time for Presidents Day!

I reached into the archives to pull out this craftivity. It's a fun way to make a Presidents' Day display.

For every student you will need 1 sheet each of red, white and blue construction paper. I used 8" x 8" square sheets, but you can avoid a lot of cutting by using 9" x 12". You will also need cardboard patterns of Washington & Lincoln. I found silhouettes online, printed them, and then traced them on cardboard. Cut them out and your resources are ready.

Since paper weaving has been around forever, I'm assuming you know how to create the woven background. After each student has chosen which 2 colors to use for the weaving part, ask them to exchange 1 of those sheets for about 6 - 8 pre-cut strips of the same color. I supply the 1" strips.

When the weaving is completed, each child should borrow the silhouette pattern of their choice to trace on their remaining sheet of paper.

The beauty of this project is that by encouraging your students to choose 2 colors of their choice for the background, saving the 3rd for the silhouette, you will give your classroom a burst of color without having all 20+ projects look the same.

Following are some resources for Presidents' Day that I think you will love: