Let children practice using different types of words in a fill-in-the-blank-story game before making their own word list for a magnetic poetry set.
Make a Magnetic Poetry Set
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.
Become a Young Archaeologist
Want to visit a museum without leaving your computer? Virtually dig for famous historical artifacts from around the world found in the British Museum.
Amazing Biographies: Writing About People Who Change the World
After reading about historical figures and other important people that have changed the world, children choose someone that they consider to be "amazing"—either someone they've heard about or someone they know—and create a book page that highlights this person.
It's Raining Cats and Dogs! Make a Children's Book about the Weather
Kids learn about weather sayings throughout history while writing and illustrating a book for younger children.
Unveiling Idioms: A Game of Concentration
Brainstorm popular expressions with friends and family, then explore their meanings through game play and writing/drawing/cut-and-paste activities.
Follow the Word Trail: Organize a Treasure Hunt
Create a treasure hunt out of word-puzzle clues hidden around the home or yard.
Send a Smile: Make a Card for a Special Occasion
Everyone loves getting a greeting card, especially if it's homemade. Make a funny or thoughtful greeting card or invitation with pictures and a poem, joke, or riddle.
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.
Soundtrack for My Life
In this project, teens create autobiographies, adding music selections to their life stories.
Personal Playlists: Ten Favorite Songs
Work with a teen to create a wiki with everything people should know about the teen's top ten favorite songs—and your favorite songs as well! Then invite friends to add their favorite songs too.
Finding Poetry in Pleasure Reading
After reading a book or magazine, children and teens can choose a section and transform it into what's known as a "found poem."
Have You Seen the Movie Yet?
Before seeing a film based on a book, classic or contemporary, children can learn about filmmaking and create their own scenes based on their favorite moments from the book.
Creating Comics and Cartoons!
Using published comics and cartoons as examples, children can create their own while playing with images and language.
Where the Sidewalk Ends by Shel Silverstein was published in 1974.
Students are introduced to a Silverstein verse and asked for their impressions. They then draw that they imagine when they read one of his lines and then write a line or two to continue the passage.
Mickey Mouse appeared in his first animated feature.
Students create a short, humorous story with at least one action character, and then use online tools to make a flipbook.
Richard Wright was born in 1908.
Students read an appropriate excerpt from Black Boy, discuss the incident in which Richard gets into trouble, and write found poems.
Ernest Thayer, author of the famous poem "Casey at the Bat," was born in 1863.
In small groups or individually, students make baseball cards for the players in the poem "Casey at the Bat." Students can use a word processor or the Character Trading Cards interactive to create their cards.
Today is Cinco de Mayo.
Students choose to research a piece of art, music, dance, literature, or food that suitably represents Mexico and create a presentation for the class.
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.