Beginner Handwriting Dot Trick

Posted on September 8, 2023 by Squarehead Teachers

Many kindergartners have a hard time knowing where to put their pencil when tracing letters or numbers. It’s hard for them to remember the stroke order of each one and often they make up their own stroke order. Then they practice the stroke order wrong over and over before a teacher catches it and can reteach it. I’ve found a little trick that seems to help!

I take a highlighter or colored marker and put a dot where they should start their pencil.

I’ve also put it in the spot they should put their pencil when they’re supposed to write their own letter (not tracing).

What other tricks have you learned that help your students when they’re first learning to write letters?

Paint It Kids (Guest Post)

Posted on September 22, 2020 by Squarehead Teachers

I am definitely not an artist, so teaching art lessons is not my strength. Add in the complexity of virtual learning, and I was at a total loss. So, I asked my friend (and illustrator), Jessica to explain a little bit about the art studio she works for, in hopes that it might help teachers still bring art into their curriculum amidst the swamp of work caused by COVID-19. Here is what Jessica said…

Paint It! Kids is a small art studio that decided to jump on YouTube and start a channel that has been showing kids cute and fun ways to paint and draw their favorite animals and characters. However, when we realized this school year is something that we have never seen before, Paint it Kids decided that we would upgrade our playlist! Paint It KIDS just released a Elements of Art video series, with more to come. These short animated videos are a great jumping off point in your art lesson. We also have begun production on a new art history series! Our first episode is up on Leonardo da Vinci. We have also begun production for the Principles of Art and Design series. We are releasing new content every week. Feel free to comment on any video for new lessons that you would like to see us create! Links Below:

Full YouTube Channel: Paint It Kids – YouTubewww.youtube.com › channel

Color: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=09L6dJS9ZO0

Texture: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HSQHTx3nOBA

Space: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OBZun4ZHWNQ

Value: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Av8ppwR2w7I

Form: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8krIo9GrU-4

Shape: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oREYokz93dk

Line: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-3gRs8Q8elg

Spoken/hand drawn videos are for younger kids:

Lines: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tzt0V7J65mQ

Shapes: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A7EEOlSJIjo

Color mixing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_cxhwDahbm0

Self portrait: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ucwF-3N2uDQ

Our first art history video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9bpwmgdZbJw

If your school does not allow YouTube on campus, we do have all our videos ad free, with workbooks with each video for your students to complete with new content every week. Check us out at Paint It Kidswww.paintitkids.tv

Don’t Eat Pete Game Template

Posted on April 10, 2020 by Squarehead Teachers

Don’t Eat Pete is one of my family’s favorite games. It’s also been a favorite in my classroom! Since so many people have been sheltering-in-place because of the coronavirus, my mom (and former teacher herself) had the genius idea to make Don’t Eat Pete kits to drop off to local families with kids. She made each family a game board (or included stickers so the kids could decorate it themselves) and also included candies to use to play the game. (Click here or here to read my posts on how to play.)

So, here’s the template and you can let your kids decorate their own board! Crayons, stickers, markers, glitter*, paint* or colored pencil, just let your kids get creative!

Click here to download the PDF: Don’t Eat Pete – game template

*If you use craft supplies like these, I suggest putting the board in a page protector sleeve if you’ll be playing with something edible.

Click here to check out my other Don’t Eat Pete boards to download.

Easter Egg Scavenger Hunt – Letters

Posted on April 8, 2020 by Squarehead Teachers

So many of us are stuck at home right now during the COVID-19 pandemic, that I thought I’d make an easy “stay at home activity” (even though you can definitely do this in a classroom too!). Print one copy of this page per kid. Then look for an item that starts with the letter on the egg (little ones may need help from an adult). Once you’ve found something that starts with that letter, color in the shape the letter is in (the rest of the egg can be colored at the end). For older kids, consider having them write down the item name on the back of the page or in the margins. You can also have kids cut out the egg and decorate if further if you want to make this activity more in-depth. Stay healthy, everyone and happy Easter!

Click here to download the PDF: Easter Egg Scavenger Hunt – Letters

Easy Die Cut “Don’t Eat Pete” Board

Posted on October 30, 2019 by Squarehead Teachers

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I’ve written about Don’t Eat Pete before (How to play, How to play/easy Valentine’s board and St. Patrick’s Day board), but I just love this game and it’s perfect for any holiday. Seriously, I played it at every single classroom party (as a kid since my mom was often the Room Mom and again as a teacher) because it just continues to be a kid favorite… the there’s hardly ANY prep involved!!

But if you’re that teacher who wants to make something once and never have to worry about it again, here’s a post for you. My mom made this style of Don’t Eat Pete board for each holiday and then all she ever had to do was buy the candy, cereal or snack she was going to use for the game.

Step 1 – choose 9 die cuts from your school’s Halloween collection. If your school doesn’t have die cuts and you don’t want to head down to the district office to do it, just wing it and cut some simple shapes yourself. Cut them out of colored construction paper (Be careful which construction paper pack you get! one I recently purchased from Amazon didn’t include purple! Here’s a small low-priced pack that has all the basic colors!)

Step 2 – Lay them out 3 across in 3 rows on big construction paper (here’s a low-priced pack) and place small strips of construction paper between them to form a grid. If you’re in a pinch, just draw in lines using a sharpie or other permanent marker (here are some awesome metallic ones that work great for writing on black!)

Step 3 – Write numbers on each shape. This just makes it easier to remember which one is “Pete” for that round. You can also silently remind your kids by holding up fingers.

Step 4 – Laminate the entire thing! Now enjoy!

Halloween Classroom Attention Getters

Posted on October 16, 2019 by Squarehead Teachers

It’s Halloween time, so it’s time to change things up! No more “Get it? Got it! Good!” when you need to get your students’ attention! We’ve come up with a list of fun, Halloween attention getters for the classroom!

Teacher: “Who you gonna call?”
Students: “Ghostbusters!”

Teacher: “Monster!”
Students: “Mash!”

Teacher: “Knock, knock!”
Students: “Trick or Treat!!”

Teacher: “Skeleton!”
Students: “Bones!”

Teacher: “Scare me!”
Students: “Boo!”

Teacher: “Pumpkin, pumpkin shining bright!”
Students: “Halloween’s a scary night!”

Teacher: “It’s not Santa Claus!”
Students: “It’s the Great Pumpkin!”

Teacher: “Vegan Zombie!”
Students: “Graaaaaaiiiiinnnnss!” (like how zombies say “brains”)

Teacher: “If you’ve got it…”
Students: “…haunt it!”

Teacher: “Boil, boil…!”
Students: “Toil and trouble!”

Teacher: “I feel cold!”
Students: “Goosebumps!”

If you’ve taught your class any fun Halloween poems, you might consider using lines from those also. For example, if you taught your class the popular “Five little pumpkins” poem, you could use a line and have the students respond with the following line. If you’re not familiar with that poem, you’re missing out! Here it is:

Five little pumpkins sitting on a gate.
The first one said, “Oh, my, it’s getting late!”
The second one said, “There are witches in the air!”
The third one said, “But we don’t care!”
The fourth one said, “Let’s run and run and run!”
The fifth one said, “It’s Halloween fun!”
Then woooooo, went the wind
And out went the light
And the five little pumpkins
Rolled out of sight!

Click here for more fun Halloween stuff!

Halloween Coin Counting Practice

Posted on October 11, 2019 by Squarehead Teachers

Happy Halloween!! Do you have your costume figured out yet? I don’t, but I’m working on it! Anyway, use the excitement for Halloween to sneak in some coin counting practice. Enjoy another freebie!

Click here to download the free PDF: Coin Counting Practice – Halloween Costumes
Click here to download the free PDF: Coin Counting Practice – Halloween Costumes – Answer Key

Line Plot Practice Page

Posted on October 10, 2019 by Squarehead Teachers

Line plot practice worksheet! Free! Hot off the press! I made this (and the other line plot practice pages yet I’ll be posting in the future) for a friend who teaches second grade. If your classroom is already be buzzing with Halloween excitement, good luck! 🙂