Items filtered by date: April 2012

Tweet! Tweet! Life Is Sweet!

It’s now all the rage to “tweet” news, so why not make tweeting a fun writing prompt.

I’ve designed 2 “craftivity” headers for your students to pick from, that will make writing even more fun.

The results will make a lovely springtime bulletin board as well.

Make a robin template by tracing, then cutting the birds out of old file folders.

Students trace them onto recycled newspapers and cut out their robin.

They can leave the bird as is, or add a bit of color to the orange breast, yellow beak and add a black dot for an eye.

Run off the nest master on brown construction paper and have students cut around it.

The robin’s blue eggs can be pre-cut.  Review and discus what a main idea is.

Students’ write the main idea of their “newsflash” on the whole egg.

Print off their school photo and cut the headshots into ovals.  Students glue their photo to the back of the “hatched” egg.

Children glue the eggs and newspaper bird to the nest and the nest to the top of their “Tweet” paper, writing one to two “tweets”.

The other option is a word art robin.  I made this on the awesome website Tagxedo.

You can use my template, (run it off and have students cut it out and glue it to a sheet of brown construction paper & trim.) or you can have students go to the site and type in their own word list, using adjectives that describe their news, or have them type in their entire tweet!

The site is easy to navigate.

Since they did not have a bird shape, I imported one and have provided the clip art for you.  Simply use my pdf, save it as a jpeg to your desktop.

When you click on shapes on the left, you’ll get a window with all the blue shape options,  on the bottom is a box that says “add image” click on that.

Make sure “desktop” is in the top file window.  Scroll down ‘til you find the "robin" file.  Click on it to import, then click "accept" in the bottom right box.

The robin is a state bird for several, so make it a teachable moment with a few facts about your state and the bird if you like.

There’s also writing prompt about those “tweet” friends your students have and a mini certificate of praise to tweet the good news to family.

If you have an I Pad or e-mail account at school, with a real Twitter account, (easy to set one up for pupil praise purposes) why not let students who have done an especially fine job with this activity, really Tweet about it! 

Let them know about this bonus ahead of time, for added incentive!

Click on the link to view/download the Tweet Stuff packet.

I hope you can fly on back tomorrow for more fun tips! It's OK to PIN anything you think might be helpful or interesting to others too.

Happy Tweeting!

Scroll down for article #2 today...More preschool kindergarten graduation ideas.

Announcing: Preschool and Kindergarten Graduates!

I wanted to see if there were any fun templates in Word for graduation and I found this one.

I think it turned out to be a cute keepsake and quick gift for the kiddo’s.

Click on the link to view/download the pdf file for graduation announcement and cards.

I made a pdf master for you to make things easier, but if you’d like to personalize things, I’ve also left my template in a word doc that you can click on to type in a different year as well as your students’ names for the business cards. 

The file for the announcement was too big and would not let me save it in a doc that you could click on, even though I only had one on a page, but you can easily source it in your word docs. Not sure what was up with that, but oh well...

If you like the font, it’s called Tonight's The Night and is from free fonts by Kevin and Amanda.  Click on the link to download it. 

Click on the link to view the doc graduation business card.

 I also found this cute “World’s Best” certificate that I thought you might enjoy.

Click on the link to view the doc World’s Best Certificate and adapt it with your students' information.

I hope these keepsake items help you out.

Do you have a treasure you'd like to share?  I'd enjoy hearing from you diane@teachwithme.com or feel free to leave a comment here, especially if you use one of my ideas.

Thanks for visiting.  I hope you can pop by tomorrow for more fun. 

You have my permission to PIN anything you feel might be interesting or helpful to others.

End Of The School Year Ideas:

Lots of visitors have been downloading the 36-page Graduation Activities and Ideas packet, so I wanted to up-date last year's bookmark project found there, to 2012, as well as provide the rest of the numbers so if you like this, you can update it each year.

Click on the link to view/download the 2012 preschool or kindergarten graduation bookmark.

Click on the link to view/download the Graduation Activities and Ideas packet.

Presenting fun certificates to everyone at the end of the year is a nice self-esteem builder.

There are 12 different kinds included in this packet, but I wanted to make it a separate download, as I’ve had several requests for this type of thing for other grades. 

They wouldn’t know they are here, because it’s a kindergarten graduation item.

For your convenience, here's the separate certificate file: Click on the link to view/download it.  End of the Year Certificates.

I hope you find these things helpful as you prepare for this exciting time!

Scroll down for the big article for today: Word Art Fun!

25 pages.

Cute certificates(Pre K4 through 3rd grade) with a blank one to fill in any other grade, to give your students at the end of the school year.