Tricks and Treats Blog Hop

This month we are bringing you some fun Tricks & Treats for your classroom! Be sure to hop around all the different blogs and get some great ideas and freebies!



Who doesn't love pumpkins? I'm going to share with you today how to have a fun day of investigating pumpkins, while also incorporating language arts, math, science, and art!  

Here's what our day looked like:

Each of the kids got their own small pumpkin to investigate. First we talked about words that describe the outside of the pumpkin and the kids drew a picture on their investigation sheets. This is a great way to review adjectives and other descriptive language.

 

The kids made predictions about their pumpkins and wrote them down. We predicted what the inside looks like, whether it would sink or float, how many seeds are inside, weight and height, and the length around.

 

Next, we did some investigations to find out the facts!

Finding weight by measuring the kids with the pumpkin and without! Great way to incorporate more math!

Counting seeds by making groups of 10

 

We wrote the findings on the second investigation worksheet.

You can grab these worksheets for free HERE.

 

The cleaning out and counting seeds took awhile since I had to help them all with it, so if this is an activity you want to do with a classroom of students, I would suggest doing it in groups with parent volunteers!

  

 

For a fun art project, we decided to use some of the seeds for a pumpkin craft!

 

First we dyed the seeds by putting some in a plastic bag and adding a small splash of vinegar and food coloring! We made green, orange, and brown (red, green, and yellow food coloring). The kids had fun squishing the seeds inside the bags to coat them.

 

Next we laid them out on paper towels to dry. It took several hours, so we ended up finishing the craft the next day.

 

 

I printed out a pumpkin outline I found online, and had the kids cut it out and glue it on their choice of colored paper. Then we just glued the seeds on to make the pumpkin!

You can grab the pumpkin investigation sheets that we used HERE!

I also have several pumpkin freebies in my TpT store! Get each one by clicking the picture.

 

 

 

An InLinkzLink-up

Chicka Chicka Boom Boom

This week was our official start back into homeschool for the year. With my 2 girls who are in preschool and kindergarten, we are working with a book each week, tying in language arts, math, and other subjects as we can.

What better book to start the year off with than Chicka Chicka Boom Boom? We have read it before, so it wasn't new to the kids, but we found a lot of fun activites to go along with it as we practiced the letters of the alphabet.

 

The book we have came with a CD of Ray Charles reading the story, along with some fun song versions of the story. So the first 2 days, I just read the story to them from the book, and the other days we listened to different tracks from the CD.

 

For some hands-on-fun, I poured some bags of dry pasta into a plastic tub, and then buried in a set of alphabet magnets. The girls dug through and had to find the letters in order. The first day we used capital letters, the second day we used lowercase.

 

 

 

I found this cute page at http://www.pre-kpages.com/abcenter/

 

I called out a letter and they used Do-A-Dot markers to dab the letter.

 

 

 

We used a coconut tree template to make our own Chicka Chicka Boom Boom trees on construction paper. I printed out bubble letters of each of their names for them to add as well.

 



 

To incorporate some math, I drew some palm trees and put them in a plastic page protector, then we made "coconuts" from playdoh and I made up some word problems for the kids to add and subtract the coconuts from the tree.

 

 

 

We also completed this Hundreds Chart Mystery Picture of a palm tree - you can grab it FREE in my TpT store HERE!

 

 

 

 

Our last craft was another tree, made from paper towel rolls and construction paper.

 



 

 

As you can see, we had a lot of fun with the story this week!

Back to School Bash!

I'm teaming up with my friends at The Elementary Entourage blog for a fun filled Back to School Bash! We are bringing you tips, ideas, lessons, and most importantly, FREEBIES for this back to school season!

 

 

One thing that I think is so important at the beginning of the school year is to build a classroom community and make each student feel like they are an important part of the class. There are so many fun activities you can do to accomplish this! Here are some of my favorites:

 

1. The Hand Tree - students trace their hands, then decorate and cut out. Use all the hands as the leaves on a tree or petals on a flower for a bulletin board display.

 



 

 

 

 

 

2. We are Family - have students bring in family photos and display them in a fun way!

 

 

 

3. We Fit Together - Each student decorates a puzzle piece to represent them, then you fit them all together for a great display!

 

 

 

4.Web of Kindness - "Another favorite activity in the compliment category is the Web of Kindness. It starts with one student holding a ball of yarn who pays a compliment to another student. At the same time he or she quickly wraps the loose end of the yarn around his or her finger and then tosses the ball to the one who was complimented. This goes on until a web is created. It's really neat and creates a great visual of teamwork. I end the activity with the notion of no matter what grade or age you are, kindness sees no boundaries. It is something we all want and something we should all share with others."

 



 

 

5. Who Am I?  I've shared this before, but it fits my theme perfectly, so I thought I'd share it again. :) This fun FREEBIE is a great get to know you activity that helps even the shy students be able to share things about themselves. Students fill out the questions and draw a picture of themselves. Then you can gather them up and give the student a "quiz" to see how well they know their classmates! Try it again at the end of the year to show how much they have learned about each other!

 



 

 

 

More back to school resources:

Find the Differences - Critical Thinking Activity

I'm excited to show you my newest fun resource! This is a great activity for a literacy center, or a fun extra for early finishers.

I've created a "Find the Difference" set (fall themed) that includes 10 colorful pages with similar pictures on them. Each set of pictures has 5 small differences for students to find and circle. I also have included 2 leveled response pages so you can include some writing practice with the activity!

These are great activities to help your students practice observation and critical thinking skills as they compare the pictures on each page.

If you'd like to check these out, you can visit my store HERE!

 

 

Back to School Literacy Center FREEBIE

I've taken a little blogging break over the summer, but I'm back with a great exclusive FREEBIE for you! This is a fun literacy center activity for your students to practice building sentences and get  writing again after the summer break!

 

 

 

This is a paid item in my store, but I'm offering it FREE to my newsletter subscribers! All you need to do is enter your email at the top of this page in the orange bar, then respond to the confirmation email, and when I send the next newsletter in a few days, you will have access to this freebie!

 

**UPDATE** The newsletter has been sent out. If you are just now signing up for it, please enter your email at the top of the page, then you can email me at mrsthompsonstreasures @ gmail.com and I will send you the freebie. ***

 

 

Happy Back to School season!! 

July Currently

I'm linking up today with Farley from Oh Boy Third Grade for this month's Currently!

 

Listening: My kids new favorite show on Disney Jr!

 

Loving: Chocolate peanut butter Lara bars are the best! I have one every morning for breakfast with my coffee.

 

Thinking: I have been trying to potty train my 3 yr old since she turned 2! My first two kids were so easy, but she was super stubborn about it. She just spent a few days with my mom for "potty boot camp" and I think we have finally got it!

 

Wanting: My 7 year old son is spending the week with his cousins a couple of hours away, and I know he is having so much fun, but we miss him like crazy! He has 3 boy cousins, so he's getting some good man time in, since he has 3 little sisters at home.

 

Needing: I think it's finally time to cash in that hot stone massage I got for Christmas!

 

All Star: I have become an expert in selling our stuff! We are moving next month, so I've been furiously listing stuff on Craigslist and Facebook garage sale groups. It's actually pretty fun and freeing to get rid of stuff!

Summer Stock Up!

 

I'm joining a great crew of teacher-bloggers to bring you this years "Summer Stock Up!" (June 26-27 only!)  We are offering you some great FREE products to stock up for the upcoming school year!

I'm offering an exclusive freebie from my "Think, Draw, Write" pages.

These pages are great for beginners to practice brainstorming and writing complete sentences at the same time! Each page has a picture, a prompt for students to think about, space to draw a picture, and then lines to write a sentence to describe their picture. It's an engaging and fun way to get even reluctant writers writing!

To grab this exclusive freebie, visit my Facebook page and look for the "Summer Stock Up" tab!



I Know About Bees Unit

This summer has proven to be a crazy and busy one already. I will just go ahead and say that I will try my best to keep blogging consistently, but it just might not happen. We are in the middle of cleaning and packing up our house because we are moving across the world in August. Ahh yes....fun times :-)

I did manage to create and upload a new product last night, yay! It's a Bee Unit/Research Pack that is similar to my other animal packs. It's filled with fun activities like labeling, creating a poem, drawing a bee, using a Venn diagram to compare, and more! This would be a great addition to an insect unit, or just a fun spring or summer project!

 

 

 

I'm giving away a copy on my Facebook page right now! Visit my page, like & share my status about this product, then leave your email in the comments. I'll pick a winner to receive the pack soon!

 

If you already own my bundle of animal research packs, this has been added to the download!