Elementary Matters

Elementary Matters is an educational blog focused on Elementary grades 1-3. These posts will make an elementary teacher's life easier by sharing information about how the brain learns best. It includes time savers, suggestions for classroom management, hints on effective teaching of reading, writing, and math, and several ideas for squeezing Science and Social Studies into daily instruction. These posts include links to several videos, articles, resources, and plenty of free materials.

Thanksgiving Resources

Wow, Thanksgiving is practically upon us!

Can you believe it? After that, Christmas, then another year! Life, please slow down?

Thanksgiving Resources - books, videos, resources, a dollar deal, and a freebie, all with a Thanksgiving theme!

Well, I want to spend the next seven school days celebrating Thanksgiving. It's a great opportunity to "throw in" a little history and enjoy the things we are grateful for!

How do I squeeze all this in? Well, I always start with loads of books. Here's a collection of books I've loved. Some are fun, and some are informational. I like to have a lot of books for each interest and each reading level so they all can enjoy them at independent reading time! (These links are affiliate links to Amazon.)

10 Fat Turkeys

Thanksgiving is for Giving Thanks

The Night Before Thanksgiving

The Story of the Pilgrims

A Turkey for Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving at the Tappletons

Thanksgiving is...

If You Were at the First Thanksgiving

Sarah Morton's Day: A Day in the Life of a Pilgrim Girl

The Pilgrims' First Thanksgiving

The Thanksgiving Story

Books are always a great start. Movies are another fun way to enjoy the holidays!

See the above image for a link to BrainPOP Jr's free Thanksgiving video! Don't you love BrainPOP?

Here are some movies I've found on YouTube with a Thanksgiving theme. Feel free to preview them and choose what is suitable for your group!

I try to incorporate the holidays into all my subjects. This resource has loads of math and literacy activities with the Thanksgiving theme. I'll be using these all week!

Thanksgiving No Prep Activities

A few Thanksgiving-themed items are in my November Science and Social Studies Printables!

There's an information mini-book about turkeys with fun facts, vocabulary practice, comprehension questions, and a reflection page. (My kiddos LOVED this, especially the fun facts!)

This resource is also available as a stand-alone resource here:

or as part of this bundle:

Plus, there's a sorting activity, where the children have to decide whether facts might have happened in 1621 or if they couldn't have happened then. Be prepared for giggles!

Here's a math game with a Turkey theme to practice those +9 facts. My kids LOVE this one!

Turkey Nines!

I can't let Thanksgiving pass without mentioning football! As a kid, we always had a football game in the morning and a turkey in the afternoon. (My dad was a football coach!)

Here are links to a couple of football games my kids love!

Football Game Board and Cards

Counting to 1,000, plus short and long vowels:

Here's a favorite with my boys: Football Past and Present Verbs! Yes, all these verbs have something to do with football!

Want still more football learning? Try this bundle!

Happy Thanksgiving!

A Batty Art Project

I'm sure you know some children that are fascinated by bats!

After reading a great information book by one of my favorite non-fiction authors, I wanted to do a fun art project to help the children remember what they learned! (This is an affiliate link to Amazon)

Bats by Gail Gibbons

I'm not a fan of "cookie cutter" art projects that all look alike. I like to give the children an opportunity to be creative and make something unique.

We started by making a night scene with crayons.

Then we added a watercolor wash.

The kids loved how the crayons came through the watercolor!

It's amazing the effect paint has on a class of kids. Suddenly all chatting stops and they are totally engrossed in what they're doing.

Of course, some classical music in the background inspires the creativity!

Now, please tell me why aren't I bring out the paints more often?

I was tempted to give them a pattern to follow for the bats, but when I looked at photos of bats in the night sky, you really couldn't make out a specific shape. I gave each child a piece of black construction paper and they developed their own technique for making the bats.

The results were spectacular!

Each child wrote a fact they remembered from the book, and these are displayed with the pictures.

These kids are amazing!

Here's a fun resource that might be a good source for your Facts About Bats!

This resource is part of a bigger October resource with more fun Science and Social Studies activities:

Or try this Life Cycles set:

Or this Boom Learning resource:

I'm thinking I'll be reading this book real soon!
I love comparing fiction books to non-fiction!

Stellaluna

Here are a couple more informational books about bats that might interest your students. (These are affiliate links to Amazon)

National Geographic Kids: Bats

Bats: An Illustrated Book for Kids 4-8

Zipping, Zapping, Zooming Bats

Stokes Beginner's Guide to Bats

Sneaking in a Little Curriculum with a Morning Greeting

We always start our day with a morning greeting.

One at a time, the children shake hands and greet each other by name. Then they say something related to a given topic.

As we know, squeezing in enough time for everything is nearly impossible, so we squeeze in some learning any place we can! Time for social studies and science are especially strained, but we squeeze them in!

We all love starting our day with a morning greeting, and I usually try to squeeze in a learning concept while we greet each other.

After a lesson on States of Matter the day before, they were asked to state something they remember from the lesson.

After working on the 4 kinds of sentences, I had them tell statements about themselves one day, then ask each other questions on another day. Their questions were priceless! (Some of their answers were even more priceless!)

For a writing project this week, they had to tell why their school was great. (We'll be writing opinion stories!)

I read an information book about Bats, so the next day they had to tell a fact they remembered about Bats. It was amazing what they remembered!

It's never tough to think of a topic,

we just think about what we've been learning!

Of course, sometimes we just have a fun question.

Today we shared our favorite kind of ice cream!

Halloween Favorites!

Halloween is one of my very favorite holidays!

Why? Well, first of all, it's a chance to be something you're not. What kid (of all ages) doesn't like to play pretend?

Halloween Favorites! This post has several book recommendations, resources, and even a couple of Halloween related dollar deals!.

I also love Halloween because of all the great children's literature out there! Here are some favorites! (These are Amazon affiliate links!)

Who doesn't love this one?

Room on the Broom

Here are some favorites in my classroom!

I'll be exploring the world of bats this week with my class. Gail Gibbons is my favorite author of information books for second graders. She presents information in a way that little ones can understand.

I have two copies of In a Dark, Dark Room, and both copies are barely holding together! That's a good sign that it's a popular book!

In a Dark, Dark Room

I also have a few Halloween-related joke books, and they are wildly popular! (It's also an excellent time to introduce homophones since most jokes depend upon a double meaning!)

Ghost Jokes (Funny Jokes for Kids)

On Halloween day, I usually read a kid's version of the classic The Legend of Sleepy Hollow. If I have a class that can handle it, I'll turn off the lights, but I don't want to scare the dickens out of those sensitive ones!

The Legend of Sleepy Hollow

Last but certainly not least is my very favorite Halloween story, the Hallo-wiener! Who doesn't love a book where the underdog becomes the hero? (Pun intended!)