Fire Prevention Week

Posted on September 21, 2013 by Squarehead Teachers

Fire Prevention Week 2013 will be October 6 – 10. Most teachers won’t be able to spend a lot of time discussing fire prevention, so the National Fire Prevention Association has made a few quick activities for you to use, that will actually support what you’re teaching in school. For example, the NFPA has a kitchen safety checklist you can discuss. Why not have your kids circle 10 nouns, highlight 10 verbs, etc. while you go over the sheet? Grammar practice!! And for lower grades, use the Stay Safe in the Kitchen story for some quick comprehension practice.

Click here to go to the Fire Prevention Week page.

Golfing Review Game

Posted on August 18, 2013 by Squarehead Teachers

I recently saw this picture on Pinterest. I couldn’t follow the link very far, because I wasn’t a member of acvitityconnection.com, but I was inspired. Here’s my idea:

Set up: Make a box like this, with varying sized holes in the front. Smaller holes are worth more points. Then set it up in your classroom, with masking tape line on the ground, denoting where students should stand before they putt.

Game play: Group students for the review. Ask a review question, and have each team write down their answer. At the same time, have all groups reveal their answer. Any team who gets the answer right, gets to send 1 person to putt once to try to earn points. At the end of the game, the team with the most points wins!

I’ve tried numerous games like this with my 6h graders and they loved them! It disguised reviewing for the end of the year tests so the kids had a blast and we got through tons of math and science review questions!

Hot and Cold Candy

Posted on June 28, 2013 by Squarehead Teachers

(Guest Post by Loralee Leavitt)

In hot weather, kids crave cold drinks. This makes summer a great time to learn about hot and cold temperatures. Here’s a candy experiment from candyexperiments.com that demonstrates how things dissolve differently in hot and cold water.

What to do:

1. Fill one cup with hot water. Fill another cup with cold water. (You can even add ice cubes to make it colder!)

2. Take identical pieces of brightly colored candy, such as Skittles, M&M’s, or spoonfuls of Nerds. Put half in the hot cup and half in the cold cup.

3. Watch the colors spread as the candy dissolves. Does the candy in hot water dissolve faster?

What’s happening:

Because molecules move faster when it’s hot, the candy in hot water dissolves much faster. The candy in ice water might take all night to dissolve.

*Loralee Leavitt is the author of the new hit book, Candy Experiments. Thank you to Loralee for being the first guest post! If you’re interested in being a guest on Squarehead Teachers, contact us via email at squareheadteachers [at] gmail [dot] com.

Candy Experiments (Way Fun Summer Science Activities For Kids)

Posted on June 27, 2013 by Squarehead Teachers

Kids love summer time. Parents love learning. Kids love candy. The perfect combination? Candy Experiments! If you haven’t heard about this new hit book (available January 2013), you’re totally missing out.

Make giant gummi worms, turn M&Ms into dazzling comets, grow candy crystals, and turn cotton candy into slime! You’ll find all these experiments and more, plus simple scientific explanations, in the book Candy Experiments!

Candy Experiments, by Loralee Leavitt, shares experiments from the popular website, Candy Experiments, as well as experiments that have never been published before. Learn how to separate candy colors, make candy cane stripes in bowls of water, sink marshmallows, and float taffy. Each experiment includes color photos and scientific explanations. Your kids will love experimenting with their candy, and they’ll learn something, too!

But how do you know kids will like the experiments? Because kids planned and did them! The author writes this about how it all started: “One day when she was sorting through her Halloween candy, my daughter asked a life-changing question: “What would happen if I put these Nerds in water?” I got her a glass, and she conducted her first candy experiment.” Read more about these little scientists here.

This is such a great collection of fun activities for kids (especially in the summer or after Halloween). When I heard about it, I went on Amazon right away and bought 3 copies (I just Had to get one for my mom and sister, also teachers). When I got it in the mail, I spent an hour looking through it, reading it and planning fun summer activities.

The 3 R’s of Recycling Printables

Posted on June 23, 2013 by Squarehead Teachers

Many teachers have to touch on the topic of recycling sometime throughout the year (most talk about it on Earth Day). A fellow teacher requested that I make some word strips of the 3 R’s of Recycling for her to use in their Earth Day discussion and then to put on their science bulletin board. I’d recommend laminating them if you’ll be using them multiple years. Here they are (formatted to fit on a regular letter-size sheet of paper):

Grass Heads

Posted on May 26, 2013 by Squarehead Teachers

I just saw one of the cutest ideas ever over at Rainbows Within Reach: grass heads! Maybe you remember Chia Pets from back in the day, but these are way cooler because each one is a kid! It would be cool to try with a variety of plants so the hair turns out different in each one…

Take a picture of each child and tuck it in the cup before filling it with dirt. I’d recommend laminating them first so the water inside doesn’t make the ink run (or just attach the picture on the outside somehow). Then plant your seeds and give them some TLC. What a cool spin on growing plants in cups!

Discover the Forest (Kids Adventure Packet)

Posted on May 24, 2013 by Squarehead Teachers

I recently stumbled upon this cool 12-page printable packet for kids. It’s all about nature and our environment. It’s got stuff for animal tracks, bark/leaf rubbings, compasses, water, etc. Go to http://www.discovertheforest.org and click on the Hey Kids picture at the bottom right corner of the page. It will open a PDF for you to print. Happy discovering!

3 Websites Every Teacher Should Browse

Posted on May 15, 2013 by Squarehead Teachers

Teaching is much easier when you know where you can look for help. So this summer, spend a few minutes each day browsing teacher resource sites. Anything you see that you like should be bookmarked on your browser (make a folder called “teaching resources”), or written down in an organized way so you can find it later. Here are some websites to start with:

1. http://www.pbs.org/teachers/– Tons of stuff (including videos) for teachers

2. http://free.ed.gov/– Free teaching & learning resources from federal agencies

3. http://www.smithsonianeducation.org/educators/– Smithsonian… need I say more?

There. Those 3 links should lead you to enough discovery to last you a looong time! 😉 But if you’ve still got “extra” time, here’s a huge list to browse (collection of links posted by a fabulous home school mom): Huge list of links