When you plant a garden, involve children in the process by writing down questions and observations on the garden's growth in a garden journal.
Watching a Garden Grow
Learning Your Address and Phone Number
Children will learn their address and phone number to help keep them safe.
Learn About Staying Safe
Share a fun book about staying safe and then talk about real-life safety issues before writing a letter to someone in your community who can help.
Cooking and Creating in the Kitchen
After reading If You Give a Moose a Muffin, have a "Muffin Party"! Children will write invitations, follow a recipe, and enjoy sharing their homemade muffins.
Take a Closer Look: Write Around the Room
With a piece of paper and a pen, kids can learn anywhere! This activity gets kids writing, looking closely at letters, and learning some new words in any room of the house.
The Natural World as Inspiration: An Outdoor Art Show
Children incorporate materials from outdoors with paints or crayons to create pieces of art to display on their clotheslines, fences, or porches for a neighborhood art show.
Reading Signs and Labels
These activities will have children reading signs, logos, brand names, and other words all over their home and community.
Let's Play Bingo!
Work together, create a bingo board that can be played while walking around town, going to the zoo or a museum, or traveling on a vacation.
Let's Go on a Reading Hunt!
In this activity, children go on a hunt for places where they can read and enjoy books: on a family road trip, at the pool, at the doctor's office.
Note Writing at a Message Center
In this activity, children write short everyday notes, to remind, plan, request, or compliment others.
Today is the International Day of Peace.
Students brainstorm a list of current conflicts and why people fight. Groups discuss and present possible solutions and create posters that promote their particular solution.
Library Card Sign-up Month begins today.
A school or public library librarian is invited to visit the classroom to talk to the students about the advantages of having a library card. Students then take a library tour to acquaint them with the general features and resources available.
The tropical storm that became Katrina formed over the Bahamas in 2005.
As a class, students explore weather-related and other natural disasters that their geographical area is prone to and review emergency preparedness and procedures.
Gary Soto, poet and children's writer, was born on this date in 1952.
Using one of Soto's stories, students take part in share stories about their families, describe their street/neighborhood, or compose an acrostic poem using the Acrostic Poems interactive tool.
Let's Go On A Poetry Walk!
The sun is shining, the birds are chirping, and you're surrounded by brilliant shades of green! Observe and collect sensory images from nature and use the sights, sounds, smells, and textures to create original nature poetry.