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Holidays

How to Celebrate Poem in Your Pocket Day

by BrainNinjasWP

Are you looking for ways to celebrate a love of poetry with your upper elementary students? Try taking part in Poem in Your Pocket Day as part of National Poetry Month. This can be done any time of year and is a great activity to explore poetry throughout your school. Come read the whole post to get ideas how you can celebrate poetry.

We’re hosting a “Poem in Your Pocket” day as a celebration of completing our poetry unit in Language Arts. It coincides with the National Poem In Your Pocket Day held each year in April. It’s coming up soon! You can join us this year even if you haven’t taught poetry in your classroom yet!

[Read more…] about How to Celebrate Poem in Your Pocket Day

Filed Under: Engaging Lessons Tagged With: Drama, ELA, Holidays, Holidays and Seasonal, Lesson Plans, National Poetry Month, Poem in Your Pocket Day, Poetry, Poetry and Drama, Reading, Writing

How to Prank Your Students

by BrainNinjasWP

Are you looking for a fun but harmless prank for April Fool's Day? Pranks are great any time of year and they are a great way to bond with your students. Check out these free and easy to use pranks for your upper elementary classroom.

Do you like a lighthearted and fun prank? Do you have students that enjoy a good laugh? Are you looking for a way to celebrate April Fools’ Day? We were always struggling with ways to prank our students in a fun and caring way, and we’ve come up with a few great ones over the past few years.

If you have the kind of relationship with your students where everyone can enjoy a lighthearted, silly prank, then you’re doing something right. We are very clear with our students about what does or does not make for a good prank.

[Read more…] about How to Prank Your Students

Filed Under: Classroom Tips Tagged With: April Fool's Day, building rapport, building relationships with students, Classroom Community, classroom fun, Classroom Pranks, Holidays, Holidays and Seasonal, Just for Fun

How to Make Valentine’s Day Love Trees

by BrainNinjasWP

Create beautiful and simple Valentine's Day art project that can be used to make a piece art parents will treasure forever. You probably already have all the materials in your classroom. Come get the instructions and create this work of art in your upper elemetary classroom today.

Do you need a Valentine’s Day art project or activity that you can use to teach students about colour while making something special? Do you dread having to find something to do for Valentine’s Day? Are you a Valentine’s Day fool? Or Scrooge? It sounds like you need to learn how to make Valentine’s Day love trees!

There are several variations to make this Valentine’s Day-themed project listed below, but basically, it’s a tree with heart-shaped leaves. Sounds great, right? Who doesn’t need a heart-shaped leaf? So cute and easy to make! They are perfect for World Kindness Day or Pink Shirt Day too!

[Read more…] about How to Make Valentine’s Day Love Trees

Filed Under: Engaging Lessons Tagged With: Acts of Kindness, Art, Art Lessons, Be Kind, Holidays, Holidays and Seasonal, Kindness, Seasonal, Valentine's Day, World Kindness Day

How to Spread Joy With Handmade Community Christmas Cards

by BrainNinjasWP

Get your students involved in their community by making and delivering Christmas cards. It's so simple and yet makes such an impact. Find out how in this post complete with different types of cards to make and how to involve your whole school.

For eleven years we have been part of a proud tradition in our community: delivering Christmas cards to all the homes and businesses that make up our school community. We mail them to agencies and businesses involved with our school community. It is so easy, helps build community and teaches our students to do things for others.

Students love making cards. And they don’t need to be just for Christmas. You can apply this strategy to any type of holiday at any time of year.

Here is how you can start the tradition for yourself.

[Read more…] about How to Spread Joy With Handmade Community Christmas Cards

Filed Under: Engaging Lessons Tagged With: Art, Art Lessons, Christmas, Christmas activities, christmas cards, Christmas Crafts, Classroom Community, Holidays, Holidays and Seasonal

Gift Festive Christmas Classroom Activities to Your Students

by BrainNinjasWP

Do you need some Christmas classroom activities to keep your students busy during December that are still valuable learning opportunities? Look no further than this list of easy to implement (and barely prep) ideas.  Come check out some Christmas math or design a social media account for an elf. These Christmas activities are perfect for your upper elementary classroom.

You know that week in December when you’re constantly called down to the auditorium for concert rehearsals, some of your students are away sick, some have left for vacation early, and you have to keep a classroom full of excited kids busy? Do you need some Christmas classroom activities to solve the problem?

Christmas is fun and all, but it’s so hard to keep kids interested in learning, and it’s a challenging time to introduce new concepts with all those interruptions. What’s a teacher to do?

[Read more…] about Gift Festive Christmas Classroom Activities to Your Students

Filed Under: Engaging Lessons Tagged With: Christmas, Christmas activities, christmas cards, Christmas Crafts, Christmas Math, Christmas Trees, ELA, Holidays, Logic Puzzles, Math Worksheets, Puzzles, Seasonal, Teachers Pay Teachers, Writing Prompts

How to Make Recycled Can Characters

by BrainNinjasWP

Upcycle cans from your house into these adorable can characters. It's great as a Christmas craft or a language arts character study.

Here’s a great reason to eat potato chips (you don’t have to eat them, but it’s a good excuse). Have your students collect Pringles cans or any other metal or cardboard can that has a plastic lid and upcycle them into a great holiday activity. Our students have loved making recycled can characters over the years.

This activity will work with other types of cans that are made of cardboard with a metal base and plastic lid.

We made our cans into snowmen, gingerbread men, penguins, Santas, elves and reindeer as a fun Christmas craft activity that parents will cherish for years to come.

[Read more…] about How to Make Recycled Can Characters

Filed Under: Engaging Lessons Tagged With: Art Lessons, Christmas, Crafts, ELA, Holidays, Holidays and Seasonal, Recycling, Seasonal, Upcycling, Winter

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