First Grade Fun: The Human Body

{I did some posts for a human body unit over at the old site, and I am moving the resources over here.}

I found this large skeleton print-out for Bill to put together. I hooked the parts together with brads (so Bill could make him move) and we hung him on the wall. We also happened to have a book about skeletons, The Visual Dictionary of the Skeleton, which was fun to look at and taught us about skeletons of different animals; you can surely find something at the library.

First Grade Fun: Great Art Lesson Resource

I forgot how I came across this, but I found a fabulous website with daily art projects for kids. These aren't just froo-froo art projects; they are created by a woman with a BFA from Minneapolis College of Arts & Design. So the projects really teach different art skills and many are based on a particular artist, time period, or style.

If that all sounds intimidating, its not! The projects are such that you could work on them with children as young as first grade, and they are interesting enough that an older child could really get into doing them on his/her own.

The site is a blog, so you can find a new project each day for free, then there are practice sheets and other projects that you can purchase. If it sounds like I am advertising the site, I am not! I found it myself and have no association with it in any way. I am just so happy to have found art projects with substance. {Also if you follow this blog for any amount of time you will find that I am naturally a ridiculously exuberant person.} 

Check out the site at Art Project for Kids.

First Grade Fun: Learning the Continents

{First Grade Fun is full of ideas for hands-on learning for early elementary.}

Memorization is so dry and boring. Sometimes it is simply necessary, but if I can make it hands-on in some way, then it goes a long way toward making it more interesting, especially for my first grader. 

Little Bill is currently working on the continents for geography, and for a while I was simply pointing to continents on a poster for our sessions. This morning it hit me - if I cut up the poster into continents, Bill can hold them in his hands, move them around into place, and just have more hands-on experience with them which makes learning more fun and makes it "take"!

I just cut out the continents from the world poster and stuck magnet tape (cut into pieces) onto the backs. The continents (and ocean names) are now hanging on our fridge. After we use them for a while I will do the same with a non-labelled poster, since right now he can simply read the continent names. When I do the next poster I will laminate the continents before sticking the magnets on to make them more durable.

Oh and I have this small laminated world map that I put in the cabinet right next to the fridge so that if Bill is playing with the continents alone, he can check what he's done against the map.