Valetine's Day Glyph -- Valentine's Day Love Bug Craft

Glyphs are great tools to use with your homeschooler and in the classroom. This Valentine's Day, use a bug glyph in your classroom as a craft. You can integrate art, writing, and math in a cinch and have a great take-home project or decoration for your classroom bulletin boards.

Instead of putting together a pre-made product like those foam stickers, students make choices based on how they complete a glyph question form. For example, a question could ask students if they know of anyone who was born on Valentine's Day? If they answer yes, then they would, for example, add long straight legs to their Valentine Bug. If they answer no, then they would add short folded legs to the bug. The questionnaire process continues as the child builds his unique creation!

Students create their own Love Bugs

But wait! Didn't I saw something about math? Yes, now it's time for math, but shh, don't tell the students! Learning should be fun and glyphs are a way to make that happen. Student then use a glyph key to analyze their classmates creations. For example, they could look at the Love Bug legs and create a graph that illustrates how many of their classmates know someone born on Valentine's Day. How cool is that? They can even create graphs of each element on the Love Bug.

You can add more math skills and give students two Love Bugs and ask them to complete a Venn Diagram. Even better, ask them to write about their bug, a classmate's Love Bug, or even compare or contrast two Love Bugs.


You can make your own glyph projects for any topic! It's fun. I also have a 23 page Love Bug Valentine's Glyph Project download available for sale {HERE}

Free Classroom Management App Solutions: A Noise Meter

How loud is too loud in the classroom? Good question. How do you measure it? It is simple. Grab your phone, tablets, or computer and install a noise meter app. Then, set guidelines with your students for what noise level is appropriate for different activities in the classroom. For example, you should expect some noise during group work but there should be no noise during testing, right? Find these apps at Amazon {HERE}.

Here is a little free noise meter app for your iPhone that you may want to check out. It's called Noise Down. We tested out the free version and it worked for us. You can also set an alarm to go for a certain decibel level.

http://www.sweetteaclassroom.com

If that alarm goes off, then you know when your students are too loud. Of, did I mention this works for the kids at home too?

Groundhog Day Story Starters: Fun Groundhog Day Writing Prompts

Let your kiddos have a blast this Groundhog Day with these fun and original Groundhog Day Story Starters. These Groundhog Day writing prompts are sure to get great results. These Groundhog Day story starters encourage students to be creative and come up with creative stories with their Groundhog Day story starters. Plus, they are perfect for your writing centers.

A story starter is a great tool to get students writing using creative ideas. A story starter provides a prompt that creates a scenario that, well, starts the story. Then students have a free license to finish the story any way they wish. Plus, they help you meet your Common Core narrative writing goals.

I took my story starters, added great graphics, put them on pencils, and added them to a canister that I got from the dollar store. Students can choose their own story starter and even use their new pencil and write away through February. You can purchase my Groundhog Day Story Starters {HERE}.

100 Days of School Ideas and 100 Days Photo Props

100 Days of School- This 100th Day of School Photo Booth Prop Set, 100 Days Poster set, and 100 days banner is the perfect way to celebrate the 100th day of school and make 100th day memories.

It includes 10 Different 100 day printable posters, and a 100 Days pennant banner for your classroom walls, bulletin board or photo props.

It includes a 13 different 100 days photo booth props including mustaches and our original saying of I mustache you 100 questions.

You can find these 100 day photo booth props and 100 day printable posters {HERE}.

Year of the Sheep 2015 Writing Prompts

Chinese New Year 2015 is the Year of the Sheep and here is the perfect writing prompt craft to help your students celebrate. 



You will find 5 sheep prompts that you can print “as is” and the student will color the animal and write on the topic. 




The first topic asks the student to imagine being the animal, the second topic asks the student to imagine having one of the animal’s traits, the next prompt is for students who have seen the animal at a farm, the next prompt asks the students to describe climbing like a wild sheep, the next prompt states that 2015 is the Year of the Sheep, and the last topic lists the letter of the alphabet that corresponds with the animal. 





Use this prompt for students to list additional words that begin with the same letter, assign your own topic, or let students come up with their own topic. You can also use the 28 Word Wall Words about the Chinese New Year at the end of the packet.

Next, you will find the same topics formatted for a page topper. If you choose these prompts, add the animal image after those prompts and the decorations if you wish. You can either print these animal page toppers on colored paper or ask your students to color or paint them. 

The next three items for are graphic organizers to help with the writing process. You will find a clustering/web word organizer, a can/have/need chart, and a KWL (Know, Want to Know, Learned) chart. 
Next--The last pages include 28 Word Wall words about the Chinese New Year. 

Finally--Then you will find a few Chinese New Year Bulletin board posters to help you to display your work.


You can find this item {HERE}.

Printable Frozen Snowflake Hat

Winter: Create a frozen snowflake hat this winter or when you learn about snow or water cycles in the classroom. 

This snowflake craft includes a color and black and white version of the frozen snow craft. This is great if you do a costume parade in your class.

Find this item at my store {HERE}.

keywords: winter, Christmas, snowflake hat, snow headband, snow crowns frozen