Tuesday, July 31, 2012

Christmas in July- Mrs. Claus


Who is Mrs. Claus?
Suggested questions..
What's her name?
Where is she from?
How old is she?
What colour are her eyes?
Where does she live?
What is her favourite colour?
Where does she work?
What does she like doing?
What does she usually do?
What is she doing now?
What did she do last Christmas?


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Monday, July 30, 2012

Christmas in July- Rudolph and friends



Twist your tongue!
I found this activity somewhere in the net but I can't remember where.
I typed and printed some tongue twisters. Children had to pick up one and read as fast as they can.
Chocolate cocoa cravings cure colds
Santa sings shining star songs
Big bright bells banish boredom
Grumpy Grinch goes grizzly gus
Tip-top tiny tot toys
Sally's stocking's stuffed slightly
Santa's super souped sleigh swiftly slides sideways
Cheery caroling Christmas critters
Candy cane cookies keep kids coming

What's my name?
Write the letters of the reindeers’ names in cards.
Put the reference card and the letter tiles in the box.
Divide children into teams. Give each team a bag. The first team to form the name wins.
Change bags.
After playing with all the bags challenge children to form the names without using the reference cards.
Dasher , Dancer, Prancer and Vinxer
Comet, Cupid, Donner and Blitzer
Rudolph

Pin the nose on Rudolph
You need to print Rudolph face and remove its nose. Then you need to prepare a big red circle with adhesive on backBlindfold one kid, spin him/her around and let him/her try to stick the nose where it's supposed to go.


Hidden words
I prepared cards with Christmas related words such as Christmas, Poinsettia, Mistletoes,Workshop, etc.
They were challenged to find smaller hidden words
Example: Christmas
Words: sit, is, his, miss, rat, tar, this, math, chair,

Culminating Activity
We watched the movie (with Spanish subtitles) drank hot chocolate, ate some sugar cookies and of course, got a silver bell necklace to wear home.
Ask the children to ring their bells together to see if they truly "believe" and can hear the Christmas bells.

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Sunday, July 29, 2012

Christmas in July- Alphabet challenge


Christmas alphabet challenge
Invite children to brainstorm as many words as they can Christmas related. Let them write a word to each letter of the alphabet:
angels
bells
celebrate candle
Christmas
decorations,  dreidel
elves
fireplace
gingerbread
holiday holly
icing on cookies
jingle
Kwanzaa
lights
Mrs. Claus, mistletoes
North Pole
ornaments
presents, poinsettia
quiet
reindeer, Rudolph
Santa Claus, sleigh,star
tradition,  tree
under the tree
Vinxer
wreath, workshop
XOXO
yummy treats
Zzzzzzzz  
More ideas?

Christmas spelling
Spell the new words. Children pick up a card and spell the word. They choose another child to guess the word.

Discovery Stockings
Hide something inside each Christmas stocking (jingle bells, block, candy, etc.) Children reach into each stocking to feel and guess what is inside without taking it out. They have to identify the hidden object but don’t say the name. Ask them to use descriptive adjectives give clues to the rest of the children.

Guessing game
Place some Christmas related objects (or picture cards) on the board.
Ask children to pick up a card, read the guessing cards and find the object
What’s   yellow  and  twinkles?
What’s   white  and  melts?
What’s   green  and  prickly?
What’s   red    and  Ho, ho, ho’s?


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Last day to buy my store!

Saturday, July 28, 2012

Happy Birthday Beatrix Potter!

Helen Beatrix Potter (28 July 1866 – 22 December 1943) was an English author,illustrator and  natural scientist.
The Tale of Peter Rabbit was published by Frederick Warne & Co. in 1902 with an initial 8000 copies printed and the tale has never been out of print since. She went on to publish another 22 little books over the next 28 years, the proceeds from which enabled her to buy Hill Top Farm in the Lake District. Eventually she went on to own 15 farms and over 4,000 acres of land in the area.

You can read more about The tale of Peter Rabbit here
Mischief_1_article_detail
Ideas from www.peterrabbit.com


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Friday, July 27, 2012

Christmas in July and a tree map


Elves, Mrs Claus and Rudolph tree map
What do you know about elves, Frosty and Mrs. Claus? Invite kids to complete the tree maps
An elf can/is/has
Mrs. Claus is..
Rudolph is..
If Santa says, elves obey!
Played similar to Simon Says. One child is "Santa". The rest are the elves.
He says "Santa says hop on one foot". The “elves” will hop on one foot. Santa says "Stop". The children are to keep hopping on one foot until player says "Santa says stop". Repeat for additional activities such as take one baby step forward, hop, jump, stand up, step backwards, turn around, sit down. Sometimes Santa will say "Santa says" and sometimes he won't.

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                                                                        last day !

Christmas in July- Linky party

Do you celebrate Christmas in July? 
Do you have a Christmas related freebie to share with us?
Join me!


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Thursday, July 26, 2012

Christmas in July at school? Again!


We come back from Winter holidays in August.It means revision tests, mid term test, papers, report cards, and more papers...
October is Columbus and family month.School plays, field trips, open classes, practise for Music concert..
November is Argentinean tradition, Music day and Thanksgiving and we have just 30 days to finish the syllabus, practise for final exams...
December is the last month of school in Argentina. During that month we  have end of year term tests, graduation celebrations, parents meetings, and lot of things to do.
School ends and we officially begin our Summer holidays.
I never have enough time to do something for Christmas in December. Just colour some Santa's cards or write him a letter. That's it.

**Why should the most magical time of the year happen just once?**

At the beginning of this year I planned a "Christmas in July" celebration with my kiddos.As soon as I told them they began shouting and clapping and got very excited.That's how we planned our Christmas in July...

Kids were eager to discuss all the facts they already knew about Christmas and the things they wanted to know about Christmas in July.
We made a class KWL chart with all of the information.

Then as we read books, visit links in the www, we added our newly-learned information onto our chart.
we visited some websites like:


I read some information I found in internet and while I was reading the information many questions came up. These are some of the questions kids asked
Where is Santa in July? Does Santa have holidays? What about Mrs Claus?
Is he having summer holidays somewhere in the North Hemisphere?
Does he like the beach? 
Does he wear a swimsuit?
Or maybe he is skiing and making snowmen here in the South Hemisphere.
What's his favourite place for his holidays?
Who is in charge of Santa's workshop while he is on holidays?
What about the elves? Do they go on holiday?
Who will look after the reindeers?
How does Santa travel to his favourite holiday place? 
Does he take a plane? A train? Does he ride his sleigh? 


While talking about Christmas one of my students told us he had The Polar Express movie.
Most of the kids hadn’t seen the movie before so I scheduled watching the movie, too.

Back home I decided to work on:
Topics:
·        Santa Claus and Mrs. Claus
·        The North Pole
·        Reindeers
·        Elves & Santa’s workshop
·        The Polar Express

Skills:
Alphabet, Colors, Numbers and Shapes (revision and consolidation)
Giving and asking about personal information
Description of people and places
Spelling skills of new words
Parts of the speech: common and proper nouns, descriptive adjectives, action verbs
Expressing existence, ability and possessions
Commands (revsion and consolidation)
Punctuation: exclamation marks, interrogative marks, full stop.
Capitalization in names and places.
Sight words (revision and consolidation)
Writing short messages, postcards and letters.

These are some of the activities we did:

Hot Seat Santa
I divided the class in two groups. Each group had to write 10 questions for Santa.
Then groups changed questionnaires and answered them.
We compared answers (and had fun, too)

Where are you Santa?
You know what? Santa had a great time traveling around Argentina. He sent us postcards from the places he visited!







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one day left for this offer!
 

It is (un)officially Christmas in July!- again!



Christmas in July refers to Christmas-themed celebrations held in July.
In the northern hemisphere some people throw parties during July that mimic Christmas celebrations, bringing the atmosphere of Christmas but with warmer temperatures. Parties may include Santa Claus, ice-cream and other cold foods, and gifts.
In the southern hemisphere, where July falls in winter, Christmas in July events sometimes have a winter Christmas theme. These may be a standard Christmas style celebration, held at a cold time of year, as Christmas is in the northern hempisphere.


But how did this festival originate? 
The precise beginnings of the Christmas in July tradition is not very clear, although it is commonly believed that it actually started in Europe, as a way to celebrate Christmas in summer. During the summer months in the northern hemisphere, the weather becomes increasingly warm and many people crave the coolness of winter. Amid the scorching summer months, people miss the gift giving, and holiday spirit of the Christmastime. Though it is not known when it started exactly, it is probably from the 80s that the festival began to be celebrated. The earliest Christmas celebrations in July saw people throwing parties that imitate the actual Christmas festivities in December. The celebrations also included other Christmas traditions like Santa Claus, ice cream and other cold foods, and gifts. It was held that celebrating in the warm season would ensure a strong, happy winter Christmas season. 


You can read more about the history here
So have any of you celebrated Christmas in July with your family or friends? at school? What did you do?  Any fun ideas we should try?


one day left for this offer!



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August calendar & door hanger

Since January I have been offering a free set of monthly resources such as poems, decoration for the classroom, word wall cards, task cards, calendars, etc.
This is a weekly calendar and a door hanger for August.


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August task cards

These are a set of task cards to work during August. You can use the task cards with the vocabulary / word wall cards. You will find ideas for writing, speaking, drawing, etc.




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