New Years Activities - Help students make resolutions & more!

Another New Year is here - bringing along more fresh starts and more opportunities to make New Year's resolutions! 
If you're like me, you find yourself making resolutions every year to become more prepared, organized, and ahead in your lesson planning. This year, I'm helping my kiddos think about goals and resolutions they want to make for the new year.
We're going to do that with this simple and easy to make New Years Flip Book. Students start out choosing a boy or girl character they'd like to represent them. There are 10 to pick from...5 boys and 5 girls.  Each character has a place for your student to write their name so that they can proudly own their goals and resolutions! The first resolution page encourages students to consider what they will eat in the new year. This is a great time to have discussions on healthy eating. My daughter made the sample below and decided she wants to eat more healthy grapes this year!  The next resolution page has students considering what books they would like to read. They might have a specific book they want to read...or maybe they have a certain number of books they'd like to read! Next, what are your kiddos going to play this year? Maybe they are going to try to play something new, like a new sport or activity. Or maybe they want to try to play with something they haven't played with in a long time. 

The next resolution page is my favorite! Who will your student help this year and how will they help that person? 

Where will your kiddos visit this year? Somewhere they've never been? Or maybe a favorite location? It might be a museum, a park, or even grandma's house! 

Finally, have your students make a short and quick reference list of 5 goals they have for the new year! You can get the New Year's Flip Book HERE.  You can get the New Year's Flip Book HERE. 

Another way to incorporate New Year's Resolutions is with an emergent reader that ties in both reading and writing practice! 

The emergent reader is 6 pages long. It includes simple sentences that were made with Kindergarten and First grade in mind. 

I tried to include as many high frequency words as I could into each page. 

Practice counting to ten on the fourth page! And check out what midnight looks like on a clock on page five! 

The last page is my favorite... It sneaks some writing practice into the reading activity! Students write three short and simple resolutions. 

This emergent reader is included with many other New Year's activities in a pack.  You can get that pack of New Year's Activities HERE. 

You can get these New Year's Activities HERE. 

I love that some of my kiddos are wanting to make reading more as one of their resolutions. I found these fun New Year's bookmarks from Let's Learn S'more that are FREE on Pinterest: This noise maker is always a big hit too...even older kids LOVE making noise! One last idea... This New Year's fireworks paint activity is always a simple but fun one!

Don't forget to PIN this post so that you can remember these activities for future planning! PIN ME

Thanks for letting me share these activities with you! I hope your littles love and enjoy them. I also hope they make your teacher life & prep just a tad bit easier!

-Til next time

    

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Bek

I Am Thankful Thanksgiving Flip Book & Other Activities

Thanksgiving is my absolute favorite holiday to celebrate! While we should always be grateful every single day of the year, I love that this time is specifically set aside to celebrate our blessings. 

Sometimes, it's easy to get wrapped up in the busyness that comes with the holiday...cleaning the house, shopping, preparing the food, traveling, and so on. In the midst of all there is to do, it's important that we take some time to also help our kids make their own moments for reflecting on their blessings as well! 

Here are some fun, and even yummy, ideas to help you do that! 

This 'I Am Thankful' flip book gives kids a chance to practice writing (and cutting & gluing) skills while thinking about what they are most thankful for in life. 

There are nine covers for the book to choose from. If you're going to use this with your students, the books make a wonderful hallway display outside your classroom that they can take home for Thanksgiving break. 

Besides the cover, there are six additional pages to the book. Each one has kids focusing on a specific area to be grateful in. From family, to food, to friends, and more! 

One page throws a little word making fun into the book and asks students to think of all the smaller words they can make from the letters used in the bigger word 'thankful.' 

The 'My Family' page asks kids to draw and label members of their family.  When they are done, they can cut them out and glue them together at the top (don't worry, the tabs show where to glue on each page).  You can get the I Am Thankful Flip Book HERE! Here are some other cute ideas to get your kids thinking about what they're thankful for: This first idea would make an adorable bulletin board display. Imagine...a turkey with hundreds of feathers filling up the board! This next one is a Grateful Game...and it looks yummy and can be used with Skittles or M&Ms. This is a great one to do in small groups throughout the classroom!

This one is my favorite...though meant to keep kids busy while you're cooking Thanksgiving dinner, I think it actually makes an excellent math adding center during the week of Thanksgiving! An attention grabber for reluctant adders for sure!  Don't forget to PIN this post so that you can remember these activities for future planning!

-PIN ME-

Thanks for letting me share these activities with you! I hope your littles love and enjoy them. I also hope they make your teacher life & prep just a tad bit easier!

-Til next time

    

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Bek

Thanksgiving Turkey Craft & Writing Sheets

Looking for an easy, fun, & festive activity that you can use to decorate the bulletin board or hall outside your classroom? These Thanksgiving Thankful Turkey Craft & Writing Sheets are a quick print favorite addition to the other Preschool, Kindergarten, or First Grade lessons, crafts, & activities that you have planned for your kids this fall!

The Thankful Turkey Craft  comes with five different turkeys to choose from. All of them have different feet or shoes to add. Mix them up amongst your students to add a little spunk as you line the turkeys up for display in the hall.

Each turkey has 8 blank feathers. Have your kids think of 8 things they are thankful for. It always helps to come up with many things in large group or at carpet time and write them on your chart or white board. This way, students who are struggling to come up with 8 or who need help with spelling, will have something to refer back to for help. 

These two Thanksgiving writing sheets  also give students a chance to reflect on what they're thankful for! Let them choose if they want the boy or girl pilgrim next to their list. 

Get Thankful Turkey Craft & Writing Sheets HERE!

This November Mega Pack also includes the above shown activities plus, TONS more!







Get the November Mega Pack HERE!

Thanks for letting me share these activities with you! I hope your littles love and enjoy them. I also hope they make your teacher life & prep just a tad bit easier!

PIN ME FOR LATER!... 

-Til next time

       

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Bek

Summer Goals Flip Book Plus 3 FREE Downloads

{This post may contain affiliate links, which means I may receive a commission at no cost to you when you click on the link and purchase something through Amazon.}

My how the school year flies by! It's already Spring Break this week for my kids, which means one thing: The countdown until summer break has begun! 

We had one snow day this year, which means our last day is now after Memorial Day. I'd love to hear when YOUR last day of school is? (Leave in comments below!) 

Today I'm going to highlight a brand new end of the year activity that I'm super excited to use with my kids. Plus, I'm going to share some fun ideas and also give you three free downloads that you can print now and set aside for use at the end of the year with your students. This way you won't be scrambling at the last minute looking for something new and fun to do. 

So this Summer Goals Craftivity is fun, easy, and will go right along with the other activities, ideas, and crafts that you have planned for your kids to do at the end of the school year.

Six tabs provide a variety of goals for your Preschool, Kindergarten, or First Grade littles to make as they begin to think about planning out their summer break. Pssst... they will also be incorporating writing practice at the same time!

Let me show you  a closer look!

There are actually six different covers that you can choose from for this activity. There are ten different characters for your kiddos to pick from. 5 girls and 5 boys. Encourage them to find the one that most resembles them. They can improvise if needed (add glasses, or whatnot).

I had my Kindergarten daughter help me make a sample so that you can see the steps students need to take to complete this project. 

Start by having them pick a cover and color it. 

Then they can grab a pencil and fill out the beginner writing portions of all the pages included. The first page has the "I will eat..." and "I will read..." tabs. Nali (my daughter) plans to eat ice cream and read Pete the Cat books!

The next page gives students a place to write a goal about something they want to play. I plan to encourage my kids to think about something new to try. My daughter was not creative at all in her example, as she has been very eager for warm weather so that she can play outside!

Then, students can make a goal about how they can help someone this summer. My daughter wants to help her next door neighbor clean up her toys, how sweet!

Next, students plan somewhere they would like to visit. For this one, I suggest encouraging them to think of somewhere reasonable. This is a good opportunity to talk about making goals that are reachable! The zoo is a great goal for a place to visit this summer. The moon? Maybe not so much!

Then they will have a chance to write out five goals. They can be the same five goals they already created but now all in one easy-to-see place, or they could even be five additional goals. My daughter did a mix of both:

Time to cut it all out! Simple cutting and easy assembly allows for all students to happily succeed.
Throw some math in there, and have your students practice measuring by laying out the tabs from shortest to tallest!

Then glue the tabs together to make a flip book!

Now your students can take turns reading their flip books to their peers before taking hanging them up in the hallway!

You can get this activity here: All About Me Back to School Flip Book

Before I give you a few FREE DOWNLOADS, let me show you some other end of the year ideas I found on Pinterest that I can't wait to try this year:

I know the kids are going to go crazy over this popping balloons idea!

Check how how sweet this 'waving goodbye' idea is!

I am a huge watermelon fan and there are so many cute ideas in this theme:

With the new school year quickly approaching, I know that many teachers are already starting to get things organized and ready for this Back to School this fall. I've shared this download before, so some of you may have already grabbed it!  But these Student Information Sheets are a great way for you to print out NOW and tuck in your Back to School file folder for when it's time to think about the new year:

FREE STUDENT INFORMATION SHEETS DOWNLOAD

Another FREE DOWNLOAD I'd like to share is especially for YOU this summer!


SUMMER FAMILY-FRIENDLY DRINK & TREAT RECIPES

Ok, one more! Summer is the time to think about camping. Here are some FREE Camping themed sticker incentive charts that come in both full and less ink options. Enjoy!

GONE CAMPING STICKER INCENTIVE CHARTS

-Til next time

     

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Bek