Top 5 Free Contraction Activities for Centers and File Folder Games

The following are free activities that I have found and have been using to teach contractions at home. Thanks to each of the creators for making these activities available! Hope these are useful to you as well! 

1.   Contractions Cut and Paste - Great for Kinesthetic Learners, Center Work, and for additional reinforcement. Get it Free here. 

2. Contractions for a Rainy Day - Free .pdf file created by Caitlyn Jackson. Colorful and fun way to have students or children at home practice how to match contractions. This is one I am using as a File Folder Game at home with my kids!  Get it free through her TpT store here.

3. will : This file I am using as another file folder game focused entirely on contracting pronouns with 'will'. I also like this resource because Mrs. Krejdovsky (the creator) has provided a sheet to practice writing each of the contraction. It's free to download here. 

4. Bingo: This is my favorite way to teach and learn new concepts. It's fun and interactive and keeps children focused. Sooo when I found this game made by Jennifer Wilson, I just knew I had to add it to my shelf. Thanks so much! You can get it free here. 

5. Contraction Word Sort:  Sort the contractions by verb. It's useful for checking the student's progress and understanding of the contractions used. Thanks for the freebie, Amanda Zanchelli! Get the free file here. 

Hope you enjoy these!

Happy Teaching!

~ Fabi

Introducing contractions in Kindergarten

 This song has a nice tune to introduce contractions to young readers. Give examples of other contractions and ask students what other contractions they have seen in print. 

Happy Teaching! 

~Fabi

Reading about Acorns

Yesterday we went to the library for Story Time and then looked for a 'few' more books to check out on acorns, fall, and airplanes. Well, when we went to check them out, I realized I did not have the library card with me. I felt bad, because we had our books and the kids were excited about the ones they had picked out.  So, I took a leap of faith, and decided to take advantage of the comfy chairs in the kids section and made ourselves comfortable there.  Wish I had taken a picture, but in my mental picture I can see the small round table covered with books and dvds. My kids sitting around me trying to see all the pictures while listening to the stories. 

Two of my favorite books we read were on acorns. If you have a library nearby, pick them up, because I am sure you and your kids will love them!!! 

The first book  we read is called Aw, Nuts by Rob McClurkan. 




This is such a cute book geared to kids in preschool and kindergarten age.  It tells the story of a squirrel that is saving all his nuts away in an Oak tree, until he spots the perfect, one-of-a-kind acorn. Of course, he wants it right away and that's when the adventure begins. The writer tells us all the places the squirrel ended up going while trying to catch up the acorn. However, each time he almost had it, the acorn got away and the squirrel said "Aw, Nuts!"

It was so funny that even my kids were saying "Aw, Nuts!" the rest of the day and today as they were thinking about the squirrel.   It's a quick read that will bring lots of smiles to you and your kids.

 The second book, The Oak Inside the Acorn by Max Lucado tells a much deeper story of an acorn that didn't know what was going to become of him. Throughout the story, we hear the acorn remembering the words of his Mother "Within you is a great oak. Just be the tree God made you to be."

Max Lucado did a great job telling us the story of how that acorn was going to become something great. Moreover, he teaches through his book, that everything in God's creation AND everyone in His Creation has a purpose. Sometimes we can't see it right away, but God can already see it, because He already knows what it's going to be.


I recommend this book for teaching children that God's purpose for them, no matter how small they are. 






Other recommended titles through Amazon (affiliate links):

Hope you enjoy these titles! Let me know if there are any books related to acorns that you like so we can find them and read them at home too! 

Happy Reading!

~ Fabi 

Acorn - Bellota Lesson Plan

The last few days we have been learning about acorn or bellota in Spanish.  It all started while the kids were taking a walk with Grandpa and the pointed out the acorn to them. They have been looking for new acorn to add to their little ziplock bag ever since. They only have about 5 right now, but it has been plenty to make them curious, which gives them a desire to learn.

        

So, when I told them 'we are going to be working with acorns in the afternoon" their faces lit up with a 'How, Mami?"  Needless to say, nap was rather short that day. I wonder why. lol

I had some pictures with the outline of the acorn printed out from Enchanted Learning ready for them to use it. I found the image here.

Materials:

paint  (brown and white)

brushes

plate for mixing

construction paper

glue

Lesson:

1.   I began asking "What do you know about acorn?" They said 'it falls off a tree'. That's right, I said, it comes from an Oak Tree.  (Later this week, we will be doing a few more activities related to this particular type of tree)

2.   Then, we took time to observe and feel the acorn.  We talked about its colors and texture. The kids noticed the top (or Cupule) felt bumpy, hard, and that it was a different brown the bottom part (the nut). We discussed the names of those two parts of the acorn. 

3.   We also discussed that acorn are nut that squirrels and blue jays eat. 

Craft: 

Make an acorn

1.   Paint the Cupule brown and the Nut a light brown.  This was an opportunity to teach my youngest and review with my oldest how to change a color from darker to lighter.  She suggested white to make it lighter.  :-) 

2.   Once the cupule was painted, the kids made a new color and proceeded to paint the nut. 

3.   Let it dry for a little while, it took about 15 min for us. 

4.   This was the most fun part (in my opinion). Bring out some brown construction paper and let the kids rip it up as small as they can. Then wrinkle up all those small pieces.  

5.   Finish up by gluing the brown construction paper. 

Alternatively, you could ask the children what else or what would do they think could be used for creating a texture like the cupule?  (next time I'm going to do that!) 

This activity helps children:

activate prior knowledge

observe and use the sense of touch to investigate 

works on their fine motor skills (ripping, gluing)

works on reinforcing the letter of the week 'A'

long vowel sound for letter 'a'

As always, we worked at learning that acorn is called bellota in Spanish. The cupule is called cupula and the nut is called nuez. We also talked how about how each of the different part felt at touch. We wrote those down below: 

(The brown color is courtesy of my youngest.) 

This was a fun lesson that was completely unplanned for that day but it turned out enjoyable for the kids. 

Happy Teaching!

~Fabi