This week, I started helping one of my co-teachers in her 5th-6th grade natural science classes. I’m pretty excited about this new development because I think we can do a lot of hands-on experiments, crafts, and games!
However, as Friday was my 6th graders’ first day starting the new topic (the locomotor system), I decided to start off with a basic introduction. They don’t have a science textbook in English (only Spanish), so I made them an interactive notebook activity as a “cheat sheet” to introduce the information in English.
You can download the interactive notebook pages here (you have to print it double-sided, so they can fold it in half and cut it, so the heading windows will open to show the information). They cut, folded, and glued the sheet into their notebook, and, then, we read the information together, and they decorated their notebooks to their liking.
Next, I hope to make a model of a human hand to make class a little bit more fun and interactive, now that they have the basic information!
This week, I started helping one of my co-teachers in her 5th-6th grade natural science classes. I’m pretty excited about this new development because I think we can do a lot of hands-on experiments, crafts, and games!
However, as Friday was my 5th graders’ first day starting the new topic (cells), I decided to start off with a basic introduction. They don’t have a science textbook in English (only Spanish), so I made them an interactive notebook activity as a “cheat sheet” to introduce the information in English.
You can download the interactive notebook pages here (you have to print it double-sided, so they can fold it in half and cut it, so the heading windows will open to show the information). I printed off the pictures of the plant and animal cells that I downloaded from Biology Corner, and they cut, folded, and glued the interactive notebook next to it. Then we colored the different parts of the cells and their names (e.g. we colored the nucleus of the plant cell, the nucleus of the animal cell, and the heading “nucleus” all the same color), and, finally, we filled in the blanks in their notes (the answers are 1. controls, 2. functions, 3. covering, 4. liquid, 5. hard wall, 6. photosynthesis).
Next, I hope to make a 3D model of a cell to make class a little bit more fun and interactive, now that they have the basic information!
This past weekend, my boyfriend and I celebrated, not one, but TWO Friendsgivings, one of which we hosted, so, when Sunday evening rolled around, I just could not be bothered to plan different activities for all of my Monday classes (1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th, and 6th grade).
Luckily, you can still prepare fun, interactive lessons that your students and teachers will love with minimal prep work. I have accumulated a lot of fun, editable PowerPoint games that all involve very little preparation to tailor for each class and look like I spent ages making them myself!
This post from teknohlogic has saved me on many lazy Sundays. “Tic-tac-toe,” “Mystery Squares,” “Pair Up,” “Battleships,” “Concentration,” and “Picture Reveal” are all really fun for the kids, work for a variety of levels, and are super easy to edit (minimal prep for the win!). I haven’t tried the other games, but I’m sure you could also make them work in your TEFL classroom to spice things up.
I also play “Connect 4” with my students sometimes. I can’t find the free template that I downloaded, but this one looks pretty similar. Just make them answer a question before placing their piece, and you’ve got an English game!
This past Monday, I opted to play “Wheel of Fortune” with my students, and I used this free template from Youth Downloads. It’s easy to edit, you can tailor it to any level/topic, and the kids love coming up and spinning the wheel (if your classroom has a properly functioning SmartBoard). You can also download a Jeopardy template from Youth Downloads for free here. It’s the best one I’ve found and looks really authentic, which I think makes the game more fun! They also have Halloween, Thanksgiving, and Christmas-themed templates you can downloaded for a holiday Jeopardy game.
I hope some of these games can save you on your lazy days!
Thanksgiving is coming up soon, and I always like to do a little something with my students to teach them about American holidays that they may have never heard of before. With Thanksgiving, I don’t like to focus on the traditional “Thanksgiving story,” which celebrates an isolated event, completely out of the context of the rest of history. However, I think the idea of reflecting and being thankful for the things that we have is important and can be easily understood by younger children.
As I’ve said in previous posts, I LOVE doing holiday crafts with the kids because it’s fun and different from their normal classroom routine. Last year, with my youngest students (1st and 2nd grade), we made the typical hand turkeys. This year, I think I am going to make something like this toilet paper roll turkey. I never throw toilet paper rolls out, so I have a ridiculous collection of them to use for crafts at school! As a side note, I would show your students lots of pictures of turkeys and chickens and illustrate the difference between the two because they will definitely think that their turkeys are chickens.
If you grew up in the U.S., you definitely made loads of these during your childhood.
Happy and Blessed Home also has a great FREE download full of Thanksgiving activities! I’m not sure if I’ll be able to use them, but they’re definitely worth a look.
With 3rd and 4th grade, I made paper strip pumpkins like these, but they wrote one thing that they were thankful for on each strip before they made their pumpkins. They were very cute. This year, I am thinking of making a foldable craft like this to switch it up! I downloaded that free template from Easy Peasy and Fun, added some Thankgiving clipart, and want to have the kids write one thing that they are thankful for on each “flower petal.” This A-Z “I Am Thankful For…” printable is pretty cool too and could be a nice warm-up to do before making some of these crafts!
With 5th and 6th grade, we did an activity like this with lollipops. Each student chose a lollipop from a bag and had to say, “I am thankful for…,” based on the color (blue = person, yellow = food, etc.). After, we made these Thanksgiving cooties catchers. I think I edited them slightly, but they were a hit!
This year, I want to try to do a Thanksgiving Mad Lib activity like this one with my older students. We did one last year for St. Patrick’s Day, and they thought it was hilarious! I’ll probably type it up in a Word document, so that it’s “landscape” and looks better on the SmartBoard and so I can edit some of the vocabulary, but it’s a great way to practice different parts of speech, as well as listening/reading comprehension.
Update (15/11/18): I found this amazing STEAM Storytime Challenge activity to go with a book (Balloons over Broadway) about the man who invented the HUGE Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade floats. You can find tons of read alouds of the book on YouTube, and, then, let the kids make their own balloon floats! I’m not sure if I’ll be able to get my school to buy the balloons for me, but I love the idea (we will probably make paper puppets or something as a backup plan).
Update (20/11/18): I made this worksheet to go with my balloon building challenge, and I decided to show my younger students the parade floats too, but we’re going to make puppets like these instead of working with the balloons!
Update (27/11/18): Their balloon floats look AMAZING! Mickey Mouse and Peppa Pig were my favorites:
As you can probably tell, I’m all about activities that get my students up and moving as well as speaking in English. So, when my 5th graders started their “cooking” unit this week, I created this activity to tick both of those boxes!
They had to imagine that they were making something in the kitchen, and think of 3 ingredients. Then, they had to walk around and mingle with other students, asking, “What are you making?,” and, “What are the ingredients?,” and write their classmates’ answers down on their papers.
The Magic Crayons has some amazing ideas to practice prepositions of place, which I am working on now with 2nd grade! My 2 favorites are:
Preposition Races!
I divided the class into 2 teams, lined them up across the classroom from 2 desks (one for each team), and gave each team a ball or a pencil case (there were balls in one class because their homeroom teacher is also a gym teacher, but, in the other class, we made do with pencil cases). Then, I called out, “Put the ball/pencil case under the desk!”
The first student to correctly place their team’s ball/pencil case scored a point, and the game continued with different prepositions until each student had had a chance to participate!
Garbage Bag Prepositions!
For the game, we went outside and stood in a circle. I said one prepositional phrase (e.g. in the bag) and passed one garbage bag to the student on my left and another to the student on my right. The kids had to get in the bag, say, “IN THE BAG!,” and pass it on to the student next to them as quickly as they could. The garbage bags eventually met at one student, who became the new “teacher” for the next round, handing the bags to the students on either side of them and choosing one of the prepositions for their classmates to act out.
In 3rd and 4th grade, we are practicing physical descriptions, and I did this NO. PREP. activity with them last week, and it went really well. All you need is one sheet of printer paper for each student!
When each kid had a piece of paper, I told them to fold it in half “hamburger style,” open it, and, then, fold it in half again “hot dog style,” so they had their papers divided into 4 sections.
After they have their paper sectioned, all you have to do is describe a person for them to draw in each square! You can say the descriptions out loud and make it a listening activity or write the descriptions on the board to make it a reading activity. Don’t forget to make it fun by throwing in funny descriptions (e.g. a green monster with 1 big yellow eye)!
In 6th grade, we’re practicing the present continuous at the moment, and we just did an activity that I call “In the Park.”
I printed out a copy of this park for each student, and they had to draw themselves doing something in the park (e.g. I am standing up on the table., I am sleeping under the tree., etc.) Then, they had to mingle, ask each other, “What are you doing in the park?,” and draw their classmates around the park.
They’ve also just started a new unit, and the vocabulary is about TV shows (cartoons, the news, films, etc.), so I created this information gap activity for them to practice. They had to ask each other, “What is your number?,” and write each person’s name on the line next to their class number. Then, they asked, “What are you watching?,” and, “What can you see?,” and drew a picture of what each person described in the box (e.g. I’m watching a cooking show. I can see a chef. He is baking a cake.)
They like doing activities like this that get them up and moving, and I like doing activities that give them conversation practice!
My 2nd graders are working on another one of my least favorite things to teach, saying, “I have got…” Do British people actually say this? My boyfriend is Irish, and he says, “I have…,” just like me; whereas, he usually agrees with the “British English” in the students textbooks.
Anyway, we played a variation of the classic summer camp game, “Bob the Weasel.” One student stood in the middle of the circle, and the rest of the students passed a musical hot potato that I have behind their backs until the music stopped. Then, the student in the middle had the opportunity to ask 3 students, “Have you got the potato?,” and each student had to answer, “Yes, I have.,” or, “No, I haven’t.”
My younger students love playing with the hot potato, but they always think he’s a poop!
They also started learning about “clothes” recently, so I made up another game for us to play. I brought in a big bag of my (clean) clothes and a blindfold. I called up one student at a time and blindfolded them. Then, they had to pick a piece of clothing from the bag, feel it, and guess, “I have got…” They loved this!
I hope these activities can help you spice up your own lessons!
Inglés con Christina 