New Year Activities

Unfortunately, the Christmas holidays are coming to an end....they never seem long enough. Here are some of the activities I will be doing the first day back to ease the children (and myself) back into school.

New Year's Resolutions

Always a good way to get children thinking how they can make changes to their lives at school, home and in the community.  The free differentiated templates can be downloaded here.  It can also be a good activity to remind children of how to present their work (use of capital, punctuation, cursive writing etc.)

Nollaig na mBan/Women's Little Christmas (History)

If you are returning to school on the 6th of January, it is traditionally known as 'Women's Christmas'. There is a lovely powerpoint that you could show the children available on nollaigshona.ie

New Year Prayer

 I do this at the start of the school year, but usually do it in the New Year also. 

Free Writing

It is a nice way for children to recap on their holidays before sharing it with the rest of the class. I usually set a timer for 10-15 mins to give them a chance to write about their holidays.

Happy New Year everyone!

Christmas Tag

Thanks A Crucial Week for the 'Christmas Tag'. Here are my responses to some Christmas questions!

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1. What's your favourite Christmas movie? It would have to be The Santa Clause (it never gets old!)
2. Do you open your presents on Christmas Eve or Christmas morning? We all open one each Christmas Eve and the rest on Christmas morning.
3. Do you have a favourite Christmas memory? This is a hard one, I suppose setting alarm clocks with your siblings in places you would hope your parents wouldn't find to get up in the early hours to see what Santa brought! The excitement of creeping into the sitting room to find all our presents.
4. Favourite festive food? It has to be my mum's potato stuffing with the goose! And hot ports!
5. Favourite Christmas gift? Ed Sheeran tickets!
6. Favourite Christmas scent? Real Christmas Tree
7. Do you have any Christmas Eve traditions? We always get a new pair of PJ's from mam (even now!) and we all choose one present to open on Christmas Eve.
8. What tops your tree? A gold Star
9. As a kid, what was the one gift you asked for but never received? A Gameboy
10. What's the best part about Christmas for you? This year, it will be having everyone back at home for Christmas, including my nephew. It will be his first Christmas with us so I am really excited about that.

Happy Christmas everyone!

Christmas Art Activities

It's finally time for Christmas excitement and decorations in the classroom. Below are some Art ideas that I will be doing this month with my class.

Christmas Snowmen 

I recently saw this online and thought it as very cute and quite easy to do.  I will ask each child to bring in any sock that may be odd at home (the more colourful the better) to make the hat and the scarf for the snowmen. We will use little pompoms or felt rather than pins. You could also use buttons if you have enough for the class (again they might have spare ones at home).  Check out the video tutorial on Youtube.

Christmas Cards

Christmas cards are always a nice art activity to do for granny/grandad or even members of the class. It can be a useful activity on the last day or two before the holidays. I really like pop out cards for the older classes as it adds an extra challenge for them.

This is one that I used as inspiration for my class last year.

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Glass Painting

A useful way to recycle jars from home. the children add the outline of their design first and then choose suitable colours to paint them. They are lovely with a candle lighting inside them for Christmas.

Symmetry Snowmen

Doubling up with a bit of Maths these are really cute symmetry scenes.

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Nativity Scene

This is a nice group activity where the children can make a 3D version of the Nativity scene in a shoebox. Adding straw is a nice touch if you or the children can get their hands on some.

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Or try out this Nativity silhouette.

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Winter Hats

This would be a good print lesson for the children.

Christmas Tree Decorations

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This can be made using felt (it is nicer if you use the strong felt as they are more sturdy). The children can choose to make any Christmas related felt shape. PVA glue or a hot glue gun is the best way to stick the felt together.  Pop on a ribbon at the end and it can be hung from the Christmas tree. Here are some ideas!

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I'm sure a lot of you have seen this one, I had to add it in because it is so simple yet really effective!

Other ideas here & source

Here is another simple but effective example that would be lovely as a Christmas card.

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And finally, one that can be a whole class or whole school piece of art. Everyone can decorate their own star as they wish and combine them all to make a masterpiece!

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Please add any other ideas or links you have below :)

Bridges Project

I previously posted on my Facebook page about a project my students carried out this year on bridges.  I have outlined below how it ties into the curriculum and scope for integration. The project comprised of both a research booklet (available on my TpT store) and making their own bridge following studying Bridges in Science.

Theme: Transportation/Overseas Adventures

Subject: Science
Strand(s): Materials/Energy and Forces
Strand Unit: Properties and characteristics of materials/Forces

Brief overview of Lesson:

-Show children a range of bridges (from locality/famous bridges)
-Discuss the various functions of bridges and the types of bridges
-Investigate through experimentation the strength of various bridges (arch, plank, walled & corrugated). Record results as a class and compare. (Equipment-jenga blocks or similar as bridge wall, dominoes or counting cues, ruler to measure distance between blocks, paper to make arch/wall etc.)

Integration:

English: Oral Language, Procedural Writing based on experiment
Art: Construction of bridges
Maths: Measurement, lines & angles, weight
ICT: researching various bridges

Then the children completed their own project on bridges. Have a look at some of the finished products below!

Lights, Camera, Action!

Drama Games (5 uses for the '10 Second Drama Cards')

If you have a look at my TpT store here, I have uploaded resource cards for Drama. Outlined below are 5 uses for the cards, not just for Drama!

1. '10 Second Objects'

Originally, this is what I made the cards for. This game can be a warm up/cool down activity in Drama. The children are in groups and select a card from the pile. They have 10 seconds to make this object using only their bodies! (More variations included in the resource.)

2. Extend that Story (Oral Language)

Each child selects a card. One child begins by creating a sentence using the word on their card. The next child extends the story using their word and so on until all children have contributed to the story.

3. Story Starter (English)

Select a number of the cards from the pile (maybe 3-4). The children then write a creative piece of writing using the objects on the cards.

4. Make a Mime

Use the card to mime the object and the other children have to guess what the object is. 

5. Divine descriptions (Oral Language/Writing)

Without saying the word on the card, you must describe it to the class and they try to guess what the object is. The first person to guess is next to select a card and describe it. This could also be used as a descriptive writing activity, with each child having a different object. They can read it to the class afterwards and see if their description was detailed enough for the class to guess!

I'm sure you can come up with even more uses for the cards!

Pasta Art

Pasta is a very useful resource for Art lessons.  I have used it many times for Halloween art lessons but it can be used any time of year. Below is a few examples of how we used pasta to create some spooky Halloween objects.  The children chose their pasta shapes first of all. Then, they did a rough outline of the object they wanted to make. Next, they painted the various pasta shapes in different colours. We used PVA glue to stick down the pasta shapes at the end. (If you paint the pasta, it may be better to do the Art lesson over two days as it takes a while to dry.)

Have a look at some other inspirations below for Pasta Art!

Halloween Art

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Christmas Art

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Animal Theme

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Maths Week Websites

Maths Week 2015 is about to start (Oct 10-18th)! I have outlined some of my favourite websites to use in the classroom for Maths that might be useful for the upcoming Maths Week .

1. Interactive Sites

This is not only for Maths but it has some great interactive Maths games for the children to practice. It is easy to navigate as it breaks it up into Maths categories. As it is an American site, it isn't too useful for measurement but aside from that, I use it regularly in the classroom.

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2. Countdown

The senior classes love this They have six numbers and a target number to make using the six numbers and any operations. It is an excellent way to put their tables and mental maths to use!

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3. Woodlands Maths
This is a firm favourite with many teachers. It also has tools that you can used teaching such as interactive hundred squares.

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4. Topmarks Maths

My favourite game on this a timed game converting fractions to decimals or vice versa. It can also be used to convert different lengths. It is a good assessment tool to see if children can convert them quickly.

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5. ixl.com

What I like about this site is that you can select your class level and particular skill/topic that you are teaching. It does have a daily limit of the amount of tasks you can complete but can be a useful early finisher activity.

Have a look at the official Maths Week Website here for more ideas.