It's been several months since I blogged. I've fully intended to, and it really surprised me to find myself without a clue what to write about, now that I don't have a class full of kiddos anymore. It's definitely different, being a teacher without a class, and without all the normal creative supplies that I guess I haven't been without in 21 years. You know, simple things like paint and blocks and toys. I probably could, and maybe should, write about the process of letting go of those things, and how much more of me went along with them than I realized. Who would have thought that the creative side of me depended upon having paint in the cabinet and small children running around?
Anyway, I have been working away hard on my Teachers Pay Teachers store, and love it! It's a different kind of creativity, one that uses the computer rather than paper and glue, and while I am very excited about the things I'm creating there, I don't want my blog to be just an extension of my store. You don't come here for that, or at least, not only for that! Teaching and learning ideas is what this blog needs to focus on, so I've been at a blogging stand still. Until now.
This morning I realized that I want to share my TpT creations AND other teaching ideas, and I have enough photos of children and their projects to last a very long time! Today I want to share ideas around Nursery Rhymes - some I've written about before, and others are brand new. I hope you find something you can use with your children!
Humpty Dumpty
I wrote before about a fun egg dropping activity I found at Mrs Kelly's Kindergarten. She recommends hard boiling an egg, then predicting whether it will break when dropped on different surfaces, and testing to find out. The children LOVED this activity!
I've always had the children make muffins and a Muffin Man book when we learn about the letter M. I simply typed up an opening page with the rhyme on it, then each child filled in their name and a type of muffin on their pages, which went: _____ is the muffin girl/boy, muffin girl/boy, muffin girl/boy, who likes _______ muffins. If you want the pages already typed up and printed for you, it is included in my Class Books For Every Letter of the Alphabet.
The Queen of Hearts
Q is such a difficult letter to find things for, so we have always taken full advantage of The Queen of Hearts nursery rhyme! The Missing Tarts by B. G. Hennessy is a fun book to use, as the characters search for the tarts through many different nursery rhymes, and a recipe is included in the book.
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| This Little Piggy or To Market To Market | I created this cute piggy craft for International Mud Day, but it would work well with a piggy nursery rhyme too if you changed the words you put with it. Adults traced the circles for the body, head and snout, triangles for ears, and squares for legs, then the children cut them out. Half a pipe cleaner curled around a pencil made a nice little piggy tail! |
There are so many possibilities! The duck hand print is fairly self explanatory, and the construction paper ducks were very simple: I provided either adult or baby duck shapes, and the children tore construction paper scraps (strengthen those little fingers!) and glued them on. Don't forget to incorporate real animals when you can!
Jack Be Nimble
This is another nursery rhyme that lends itself to a class book. _______ be nimble, _____ be quick, _____ jump over the candlestick! As you can see, our candle stick was the non-flammable kind, but that didn't bother the children at all. It's not every day that the teacher invites you to run and jump inside!
Mary Had a Little Lamb
This one is also included in my class book set mentioned above. _____ had a little lamb, little lamb, little lamb.... so easy, and who doesn't like stuffed animals? Don't have a sheep? Ask the parents, or try garage sales, it's amazing what you can find!
I've also mentioned this one before, it's available for FREE here! I made two versions, one with a picture to color, and this one for us to paint our own sheep on. I provided the black head shape and eyes after the children finger painted their colorful sheep. It amazes me how different each sheep is when we make this, and the children love reading the books they helped to make.
The Itsy Bitsy Spider
Okay, I'll admit it, I don't think this one is included in any of the Mother Goose Nursery Rhyme collections, but every child knows it and loves it, so I'm going to include it! I found this idea in Mailbox Magazine several years ago. It's simply a house shape, with a bendy-end straw as a waterspout, with a Halloween spider ring slipped onto it. A little tape at the top and bottom of the straw so the spider doesn't get lost, and as you can see, the children loved to sing the song and act it out. Coloring our houses and moving the spider were fine motor workouts, and with the song added in we have literacy and vocabulary development too. Not too bad for a bendy straw and a plastic spider!
If you have children who are learning to read, I do have one more fun nursery rhyme activity to share with you: My Nursery Rhyme Sentence Picture Match has 12 simple sentences and pictures for young readers to pair up. It makes a fun center activity, and there is a follow up worksheet included. My kindergarteners last year LOVED my sentence picture matching activities, and inspired me to start making more of these activities.
Of course there are many, many other nursery rhyme ideas that I haven't touched on. I have some pinned to my Nursery Rhyme Pinterest board,
and I'm always on the lookout for more fun teaching ideas. Do you have a favorite nursery rhyme activity you'd like to share? I'd love to hear from you!
So fun! I love it!
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