Idea Gallery

10/2/09 - From Diane Koehnk at Morningside Elementary

My children are making their own books for The Hungry Caterpillar for "Read for the Record Day", October 8, 2009.  We will make the little and big caterpillar into puppets.  For the cocoon we will wrap a cloth around the big caterpillar.  We are decorating the pages with glitter, tissue paper, real leaves, paint, yarn etc...    And of couse our butterfly will be beautiful. We are also going to plant milk weed seeds to take home. Hopefully we will to watch a caterpillar turn into a cacoon and watch the butterfly emerge.

Download a zipped folder of all the Boardmaker files to create the book here (you must have the Boardmaker software to open and print these files).

10/2/09 - From Ayna Molina at Airbase Elementary...

I have two students who love our Wheels on the Bus Board and are non-verbal soooo… I decided to make them their own boards to take home.  They are about the size of a regular sheet of paper.   Here are the Board maker docs for them and pictures of how they turned out.

Wheels on the Bus board

Wheels on the Bus song symbols

Ideas for "The Very Hungry Caterpillar" - Read for the Record Day - October 8, thanks to Cathy Zoldak from Gratigny Elementary!

Shared Reading/Storytime/Large Group: I found these icons to print (click on picture to the left to download), laminate, and use with flannelboard for sequencing and retelling of story after repeated readings. Send home with each child (with the book, rotate nights) in a Ziploc bag so children can "read" the story to their parents by retelling it.

Art Area: Cut out large simple butterfly shape for easel painting.

SGT/WT: Provide simple butterfly shapes and paint. Intro lesson with the book and talk about how the butterfly's wings are the same design on each wing (symmetry). Paint on one half of butterfly and then show them how to fold paper to make the same design on each wing (if they wish). After they dry, hang them paint side down from ceiling so they can look up and see them "flying." In House Area, have pretend apple, pears, etc. in cooking activities. Send home info to parents about Butterfly World in West Palm Beach! Snacktime: eating apples, pears, etc. Counting sets to five: i.e., one apple, two pears, etc. in the story. Use eye droppers (fine motor!) and children "drop" different colored food coloring onto coffee filters (it's really fun to watch the color spread)...then use clothes pin to pinch it in the middle to make butterlfy (or pipe cleaners in the middle or however the children want to creatively represent!) Hang from ceiling! They turn out beautifully!

Book Area: Science books about butterflies/caterpillarsVisit butterfly garden (our school has one!). Take binoculars or pretend binoculars (toilet paper tubes glued together!) Punch holes and string yard so they can wear around their necks. :)

LGT: There is a game called "Elefun" (about 19 bucks): (you can see it at amazon.com)...that "shoots up" vinyl butterflies from elephants trunk and they float in the air and the children catch them with nets (four come with the game...can get extra ones at dollar store or Target summer clearance...) Make butterfly "wings" by giving each child colored crepe paper streamers to hold and sway in the air as they dance to classical music...

OT: same as above but the streamers fly in the wind!

Idea from Stephanie Rad Quintana from Airbase Elementary:

This is a home communication board I made for one of my students last year.  The board is very simple. I made it because J. would go home on the bus and his mom was DESPERATE to communicate with him about his day at school. He takes the board home with him and his mom can sort of “guide” the conversation. I made some pictures to put on it, but sometimes I would just draw a picture. In the last section, I would write something, maybe to prompt his mom to ask him a specific question. This board REALLY helped with the “What did you do in school today?" "Nothing” situation…

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Lissette Gil and Dolores Mendoza want to share this link to a cute video and song for how to stay safe while shopping in the crowds of the holiday season. ENJOY!

This is our LEAP Giving Tree.  I have it posted on our door with cutouts sticky-tacked on the I labeled with items we need in the classroom.  As Roni suggested in the beginning of the year, we have low-priced to high priced items and we added on volunteering opportunities as well.  The cut-outs are holiday themed and the parents see our tree and take one off as they please, when they come to drop off their child.  We change the items on a monthly basis depending on what we need: copy paper, juice, cookies, bubbles, playdough, velcro, a volunteer to cut out laminated pictures, a volunteer to clean classroom toys, etc.  This idea has been very helpful for our class this year!  One of the parents volunteered to make our "Giving Tree" - Bryan Slattery, and the parents have been really involved in make our class even better this year! 

Miss Ame Travieso
Pre-k SPED Teacher / LEAP Redondo Elementary School

Deanna DeCario from South Miami impressed our visitors from Georgia with her excellent implementation of curriculum and her high student expectations. One thing we all loved when we observed her class was one of her greeting time songs. Here are the words. Do it as a chant or make up your own tune:

Sunday, Monday, Tuesday - clap
Wednesday, Thursday - snap, snap, snap
Friday - hop
Saturday - stop
Turn around and spin like a top.
Seven days in the week you see,
Now we'll sit so quietly.

Dawn Peralta from Madie Ives Elementary has created an extensive list of children's books for parents to use to support the concepts being taught in Shared Reading, as well as a cover letter to send to parents at the beginning of the year. Links to this document will also be found in Teacher Handbook, Appendix S (currirulum, BELL) and Y (family involvement).

Shared Reading Book List by Dawn Peralta

This GREAT IDEA was submitted by Michelle Skalski and Delia Katz from Tropical Elementary:

We designed a poster/chart that teachers and students can use at the end of the two week period of reading a particular book in Shared Reading to review the key points of the book.

This Shared Reading Book Summary Chart includes the Title, Main Idea, Author, Illustrator, Characters, Setting, and Sequence. It provides visual support for young students to better understand what is being reviewed. Teachers may use the visuals to build and extend language for second language learners. The pictures may also be used as Alternative/Augmentative Communication for students with various language abilities.

To start building your own Shared Reading Book Summary Chart,

download the symbols here!
(Boardmaker Program must be installed in your computer in order to open files)

(Some story specific symbols may be needed for the Sequence section. Michelle and Delia recommend using symbols from the Cheap Talk 8 overlay for each title - see below)

Kristi Perez from E.W.F. Stirrup Elementary writes: "Our students this year are really into numbers and counting objects so we created an outdoor activity with the dice with numerals and with the hula hoops. The children took turns rolling their dice, identifying the number independently or with the help of their friends and placing the corresponding number of hoops on the floor. The children then hopped over each hoop as they counted their hops. They truly enjoyed guessing if they were going to hop over many hoops or just a few."

Susan Ramsey from Gulfstream Elementary (Reverse Mainstream) offers this testimonial to the Pre-K Tech Team regarding the power of picture support during Shared Reading and Phonological Awareness activities:

Just a note to let you know how much I appreciate what I learned last summer with you about designing and using visuals to support our literacy program. Children who were usually inattentive started participating more; some could not wait to match their picture cards to the matching picture on the letter or rhyme poster.

The pictures helped me to prompt more language for students, expand on concepts better (ie. classifications, not the same, the same), and describe more characteristics when cuing a child to look at their picture card for certain details.

It was great having all the picture scans for the posters available (Pre-K SPED teachers may contact Sheila or Tina about acquiring and using these materials). Susana Cardona, the best para in the world, printed them, cut them, laminated them and adhered Velcro pieces to the posters and corresponding pictures. She also set up a filing system with envelopes of support pictures,  the scans and photos from magazines.

Downloading the pre-made story boards has been great (see all story downloads here), and your suggestion of giving them to certain children to hold and use has optimized our Shared Reading Time. We were able to a have more interesting and interactive learning experiences. Thank you. Thank you.