Fire up KS2 pupils' imagination with this collection of 16 fictional stories with activities, all written by literacy expert Pie Corbett

Engage kids in art projects in a variety of media, with many based on famous artists or art movements.

This post shares 3rd grade literacy center ideas that work with any Language Arts curriculum and last the entire school year + FREE printable

Looking for fun Dinosaur Preschool Theme Activities? You will love this set of Preschool Dinosaur Centers and No-Prep Worksheets.

At the beginning of the year I was getting the above question about a million times a day. I had explained to my students that they always had the option of reading, finishing morning work or practicing their spelling words. Well, those options worked for a while but then the question came back and I knew something needed to change. I took to good ol' Pinterest to get some ideas on brain breaks or activities for fast finishers. After I found a few great things, I used a combination of those ideas and came up with my own system. Introducing the "Sticks Center" Now, when my students are finished and are sitting there with nothing to do, they have the option to read, finish their morning work or "do the sticks." Simple system that works like this. 1. Draw a stick 2. Do what it says Simple right? :) Here is a closer look at the sticks in the can: These are all of their options. The rule I have is they can't look when they draw a stick and whatever they get, they have to do or they go back to their seat and read.("If you're gonna do the sticks, you do 'em right" I say that a lot) If they draw the same stick in a day they don't have to do it twice, they can redraw. Been doing this for about four months and it has been great so far, they enjoy it and are great at completing the activities. Very little work on my part and they don't ask me the dreaded question anymore! Here are short explanations of each stick. Flash Cards: There are two sets of multiplication flashcards (about 20 cards each) they take them back to their seat and go through the cards twice. Word Problems: The students gets to be the teacher and they write me two word problems. I have to solve it by the end of the day. The only rule is, they have to know the answer to the problem! Sometimes I solve it wrong to see if they can catch my mistake... they have no idea and get so proud of themselves when they catch my mistake! Spelling ABC Order: Write that week's spelling words in alphabetical order. Wrap-Ups: Subtraction and multiplication manipulatives. Buy here. Spin Multiplication: Fun interactive multiplication flashcards. Thanks to the teacher who had my room before me! Random Worksheet: This folder is full of random challenging worksheets. They have to draw a random one without looking. There are all kinds of things in there like crosswords, riddles, math challenges, word searches. Book Report: Students get a piece of notebook paper and write a short summary of a book they read recently. Just for Fun Book: I have a tub full of lower-level children's books. I still think those are fun to read so why wouldn't fourth graders? Spelling Story: Students write a story containing all of their spelling words. Rhyming Words: Students pick a word and write as many words that rhyme with it as possible. Write a Short Story: Students write a story no longer that a page about anything they want! Math Challenge Number: I created a worksheet with a different number at the top. They pick one and each worksheet has them adding 15 to the number, subtracting 25, writing the number with words, dividing by 3, and multiplying by 13. Really makes them think! Write Cursive Letters: I don't make my students write in cursive very often but they still need to practice. For this stick they simply have to write their cursive alphabet. Spelling Pictures: Students draw a picture to go along with each spelling word. Spelling 2x Whiteboard: Students grab a whiteboard and write their spelling words two times each. Dictionary Hunt: I love this one! Students use a dictionary to find 3 words they don't know. They write the word, the definition and draw a picture to go with it. Write 20 Verbs: Pretty self explanatory. Write 20 adjectives: Ditto! Alphabet List: Students write their alphabet, then try to come up with a word for each letter. Bonus if they use past vocab or spelling words. Boggle: My kids are OBSESSED with this one right now. I printed out some pre-made boggle lists with 20 letters. They are all trying to beat each other for who can come up with the most words. One of my students has a list of 112 going right now.. she won't quit! I LOVE it! ABC Order Challenge: In one of the trays I have multiple worksheets that have lists of words that start with the same letter and need to be put in alphabetical order. They are tricky and my kiddos like the challenge. Addition Challenge has been replaced with Division Challenge: A large sheet of division problems with remainders. My kids love to do these and see if they can get them all right in one try! This truly has been great for my classroom! It makes my kiddos use their brains all day long, no sitting doing nothing and a lot less getting into trouble in between activities! Try it, you'll like it!

Any teacher who has seen words like “nice” and “good” one too many times in student writing can vouch for the importance of teaching shades of meaning. When kids have the understanding that synonyms can be closely related and differ in intensity, it helps them make stronger word choices in their writing. As if that isn't enough of a bonus already, it’s a big ticket to improvement in reading comprehension and vocabulary development too.

What is the weather like today? Is it sunny or cloudy? What will the temperature be today? Help your kids observe and record the day's weather with this simple free printable weather chart.

If your kids are anything like mine, they stomp their feet and are full of protests when it's time to practice handwriting. I get it; writing letters over and over can get super boring. Thankfully, that's not the only way to practice. Round up your art supplies and get your kids excited to work on their handwriting with these skill-building exercises that also double as fun activities. This one, for example, lets your child dot a letter outline with a cotton swab dipped in paint. Kids like anything with the potential for mess paint involved, so this should be an...

Building up your student’s times table fluency is so critical in helping develop their numeracy skills, but also in building confidence to become competent

The aim of the series is to provide comprehensive and structured daily practice of already-taught literacy and language skills in spelling, word study, punctuation and grammar in order to consolidate and develop a student’s ability and confidence to use English.

Welcome to another guest blogger ~ Pixie Anne with some ideas to help you with Hello! I'm Pixie Anne from Growing Little Learners and I am delighted to be blogging here at the amazing Adventures in Literacy Land today to share how we use a Working Wall in Literacy in my classroom. Working Walls are such a great way to have an up to date, relevant, child led display that supports learning in the classroom and helps the children to see the bigger picture and learning journey they are on! An added bonus is that they are so easy to throw together throughout the week as you are doing the work in class anyway - no extra cutting and laminating at home, no hunting for the perfect image or trying to be super creative with ideas! I love mine! So today I've decided to share how my most recent one came together and there's a freebie for you at the end so keep on reading... The Working Wall always starts with an example of what we are aiming for by the end of the week (What A Good One Looks Like). We began our week of instruction writing (inspired by George's Marvelous Medicine) by Gathering Content. We investigated bossy verbs and adverbs by playing some simple games (Simon Says and Adverb Charades) and then looked at a whole bunch of different instruction texts to hunt for examples of each to add to the working wall. To understand and explore the features of the genre and create a Success Checklist I brought in lots of recipe books from home. They were out on tables with post it notes when the children arrived in the morning and I challenged them to work in pairs to find and label some of the features they could see. We had a class discussion about the features they spotted and I jotted them down on strips of paper to refer to in the next activity. I gave out copies of recipes for them to annotate with the features. This was a perfect chance for me to gather a bit of reading evidence too - understanding the features of a non fiction text! The wall so far... Next came the Planning. We had a lot of fun coming up with disgusting ingredients together in some shared writing (my poor Learning Support Assistant was looking a bit green by the end of the session!), This girl had lots of good ideas! We also planned ideas for the method using time connectives and all the bossy verbs and adverbs we had previously generated. Here's how the wall was looking at this point. I desperately need a bigger wall but have no space in my classroom so I have to squash it all in as best I can! Then comes the Drafting! We recapped what we had learned so far (using the wall!), I modeled my own recipe and then asked them to work on their own. My support group still really struggled to set the instructions out correctly even with a writing frame and had the method written in the 'you will need' section but the content and what they were trying to write was good! Here is one from one of my stronger writers and this was added to the wall as a best example. We ran out of time and I couldn't squeeze on the Editing and Improving heading. We will bring to a published form for a class recipe book next week but for now the working wall is complete and shows the learning journey we went on when writing our instruction texts! I really do love these displays and strongly feel they support the learning in the classroom. I feel a little embarrassed by the tatty headings I have on the board, so I have created some new ones to use which I want to share with you! Click here or on the picture below to grab your freebie! There are different choices of headings depending on how you phrase things in your classroom. I hope you've found some inspiration or ideas here that you can use! I'd love to hear how you use working walls in your classroom or any tips you have on how I can improve mine so please leave a comment or contact me over on my blog (Growing Little Learners)! Thanks again to Adventures in Literacy Land for having me join you for today - it's been great! Take Care

In working with my 2nd grader just recently on contractions again, I created some SIMPLE Contractions Puzzles. Seriously. There are no bells and whistles with these. Just simple, easy-cut puzzles. *This post contains affiliate links. **The free download can be found at the END of this post. Introducing Contractions to Readers Contractions can ... Read More about SIMPLE Contractions Puzzles

Check out thisFREE Opinion Writing Craft. This cute doughnut is perfect for your Literacy lessons and centers for your little learners!

I have a fun reading resource for you! Book Talk is loaded with ideas to use for retelling stories, comprehending reading, and using books and tools to share some good conversations. Click here for a preview. Students will have plenty to do during reading time. Plus, there are some great homework ideas too! I recently updated this cover and added more graphic organizers and activities to this resource. Here are just a few examples of what's included: Questions to ask partners or questions for parents to ask their child about the book they are reading. It helps start and guide the conversation about books. If you ONLY want the Book Talk Questions, scroll to the bottom of this post. The questions come in a variety of ways. You can get them all on one sheet or on small papers like below. I put a ring on these and students have a ton of questions to ask themselves or with their partner. These are handy and ready to go on a moments notice. You can use these questions for any genre you are reading. This pack includes 5 book reports with directions and rubrics! Just copy and send home for homework projects. This pack has graphic organizers to keep the conversation going through writing. Over 40 graphic organizers included! Also some reading activities for students that finish early or need some more enrichment. One sheet is for partners to do together and one sheet is for the individual learner who can work at their own pace. You will be sure to find some reading logs in this pack too. There is even one for the entire class to keep track of the books you read together as a class. Plus so much more!!! All activities can be used with any book or any reading program you use in the classroom. You can find Book Talk here on my blog for a discounted price: Discounted Price:Sell ebooks If you ONLY want the Book Talk Questions, click the picture on the left. This pack has 10 pages full of questions students should be answering while reading their story. You can only purchase these questions here on my blog. Click to read more about it. If you ONLY want the book reports, Click on the picture below. Book Reports have 4 book reports with directions and a grading rubric. There are also 3 extra reports to use at anytime! You can ONLY buy this on my blog right now. Thanks for stopping by! See you soon,

To start my comparison between Guided Reading and Strategy Groups, I did some digging. Check out these amazing facts about the history of Guided Reading! There are many definitions for Guided Reading and Strategy Groups out there. These are my best explanations for both teaching strategies. And to compare the two even farther, check out

Help your students learn how to end a sentence with proper punctuation. Is it with a question mark, a period, or an exclamation mark? This exercise will also help with reading, grammar, and fine motor skills. The worksheet can be used in a variety of ways. Students can either write the punctuation in the boxes at the end of each sentence, or they can cut and paste using the strip provided on the right side of the worksheet. Spring Punctuation Answer Key

Want to set up a successful alphabet literacy center in your preschool classroom? Learn how to make learning the ABCs fun for your kids...

These games are excellent fillers and even better for those early finishers who need a challenge! How about some good old fashioned Boggl...

So, I posted recently that my sixth graders were writing a mystery that was going to take place in the library. I took two of the best mysteries that were submitted and combined them! Here's how our mystery looked: The Problem: Mrs. Svarda got to school on Monday morning and saw the mess. At first she was just mad that all of the books were out, then she saw that all the books were missing their endings. She picked up a book and noticed that the barcode was missing, too. She looked around and found that several books were missing their endings and barcodes. The scanners were also missing so no one could check out books! Then Mrs. Svarda was scared and mad. Who could've done such a thing? What happened here? How could this happen? She needed help. Starbelly Sneetch Alibi: It was 5:00 and I heard a knock on my door. It was Fox in Socks. He came in and I turned off my music and put away my IPod. We played at my house until we got bored. We decided it would be fun to go to the movies. We texted Hop On Pop and Yertle the Turtle to see if they wanted to come, too. Everyone came to the movie except Hop on Pop. After the movie we couldn't think of what to do so we walked around. We thought we might stop by the library to visit Hop On Pop. It started to rain as we walked so we stopped at Fox in Sock's house to pick up some blankets to keep dry on our walk. Hop On Pop Alibi: It was 5:00 and I was looking at my clock when the doorbell rang. It was Yertle the Turtle. He had brought me some homemade bread. He asked if I wanted to go to the mall. My mom said, "No. I had to work on my homework at the library." Yertle the Turtle got a text right after that asking if we wanted to go and see the Diary of a Wimpy Kid movie. Bummer. I really wanted to see a movie and hated that I had to go to the library instead. Yertle the Turtle left to meet everyone for the movie. I headed to the library with my homework. My animal report was due on Monday and mom said I couldn't do anything fun until I was finished with the report. The fun thing was that everyone came by the library after the movie and told me all about it. They had a great time. At 8:00, everyone had to head home. I had about thirty minutes left of homework, so I told them I'd have to stay around just a bit longer... Yertle the Turtle Alibi: It was 4:00 and I was cooking some homemade bread. When it was done I wanted to have some fun so I took some bread over to my friend Hop On Pop. I asked if he wanted to go to the mall, but then I got a text from Fox in Socks and Starbelly Sneetch asking if I wanted to go to the new Diary of a Wimpy Kid movie. My mom said I could go to the movie, but his mom said he had to do homework. He tried not to show it, but boy, was he mad. I had to leave Hop On Pop to make it to the movie on time. I told him if we had time, we'd stop by the library after the movie to hang out with him. Fox in Socks' Alibi: I was sitting in my room when my mom came in and said when I finished my chores I could play. I decided to go over to Starbelly Sneetch's house to play. We thought it would be fun to go to see a movie and texted our friends to see if they could come, too. When the movie was over we went by my house to get some blankets because it was raining and we didn't want to get wet. Then, we headed to the library to visit Hop On Pop because he was doing homework there. At the library, I looked for the Diary of a Wimpy Kid book. I really liked the movie so I thought I would like the book. What the students do: When the students entered the library, they each grabbed a clipboard with a pencil, ingredients of a mystery checklist, alibis, map of the crime scene, and suspect list attached to it. They also grabbed a highlighter. I had the problem and alibis typed up on my SMART board including pictures of the characters. I read the problem and each alibi to the students. We walked through the ingredients of a mystery and checked off all of the mystery elements that our mystery had on the list. Then, I separated the students into two groups. One team surveyed the crime scene and drew the map of the evidence in the crime scene first. The second team worked in teams to read through the alibis and highlight evidence they found in the text that made them believe a character or characters might be guilty. After ten minutes, the teams swapped stations. We returned together as a group to discuss all of the evidence the students had found in the crime scene as well as the alibis that led them to believe that specific characters could be guilty of the crime. We completed the suspect list together. Students work in teams to highlight evidence in the alibis. Students sketched the crime scene. We taped off the crime scene with caution tape. The crime scene included Diary of a Wimpy Kid books, barcodes with fur on them (from characters), endings ripped out of the end of the Diary of a Wimpy Kid books (these were really just copies I ripped), a blanket, movie ticketes (3), and a book about bumblebees (this was the book Hop On Pop was using to do his research for homework). I found the copies for the ingredients of a mystery checklist and suspect list from Beth Newingham's Scholastic post about the mystery unit she teaches in her classroom. The Solution The students really thought like detectives in this lesson! I did catch a few of them off guard with my red herrings, though. The fuzz on the barcodes made some of them immediately suspect Fox in Socks and the Starbelly Sneetch. One of the kids said, "This is the best lesson we've had in the library all year!" So, you can make whoever you want responsible for the crime. I decided that Hop On Pop was guilty. He was mad that he did not get to go to the movie with his friends. He was working on his report about bumblebees (since bears love honey) and had to stay later than his friends in the library to finish up. All of the other characters visited the library to visit Hop On Pop and they did not say anything about something being wrong in the library. Hop On Pop tore the endings out of the books when his friends left. To excite the kids about checking out mysteries in our library, we created a mystery display. All of the books were sealed in brown paper bags with the barcodes on the outside so we could check the books out without opening the bags. Each bag had a different mystery inside. This was a fun way for our students to try reading something new in the library and practice their detective skills we learned in our lesson together! Mystery books in mystery bags!

Learn how to play the Kaboom game in your classroom to make practicing math facts, sight words, and more a blast for your students!

Printable Free Online Worksheets are available for you to print! Give your child some extra practice to build their new skills with these printable worksheets.

Plurals Poster Set Plurals never looked so good! This set of colorful posters reminds students when to use "~es" to form plurals. The instructions are clear, the illustrations are crisp... and your class is sure to love them! This set includes: * Using '~es' after words ending with 'x' * Using '~es' after words ending with 's' * Using '~es' after words ending with 'ss' * Using '~es' after words ending with 'zz' * Using '~es' after words ending with 'sh' * Using '~es' after words ending with 'ch' * Using '~es' after words ending with 'o' (+ the exceptions to this rule) ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ LIKE THIS PRODUCT? YOU MIGHT BE INTERESTED IN: 50 Spelling Printables for Any Spelling List (First and Second Grade) Differentiated Guided Reading Printables Multiplication Printables (NO PREP!) Early Finisher ELA Games for Second Grade Early Finisher ELA Games for First Grade Spelling Task Cards (3 levels with accompanying booklets) ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ How to get TpT credit to use on future purchases: • Please go to your My Purchases page (you may need to login). Beside each purchase you'll see a Provide Feedback button. Simply click it and you will be taken to a page where you can give a quick rating and leave a short comment for the product. I appreciate your feedback and the time it takes you to do so! Be the first to know about my new discounts, freebies and product launches: • Look for the green star near the top of any page within my store and click it to become a follower. You will then receive customized email updates about this store. Need British, Australian/NZ or Canadian spelling? • Email me at isla(dot)hearts(dot)teaching(at)gmail(dot)com with your username, date of purchase and spelling request, and I will be happy to alter the US spelling for you. Please note: This ONLY applies to the spelling of words (e.g. color > colour) and does NOT include a revision of the product itself. Thanks for your understanding! Isla Hearts Teaching FOLLOW MY STORE Facebook Pinterest Twitter

These kindergarten anchor charts will give you the tools you need to teach math, reading, friendship skills, and much more!

Reading Response activities will likely form a major part of your reading programme, whether you are running guided reading groups, a daily 5 system,

Are your students having trouble adding interest to their writing? Does their writing all sound the same? Is it missing a hook? Missing an organized middle? Do they write, “THE END” to let the reader know they’re finished? Keep reading to find out how to help your students take their writing from drab to FAB! […]

One of my favorite language arts lesson to do in teaching students about synonyms. Using the idea of a "synonym roll," every year my student...

One of my favorite things I like to do is browse other teachers’ classrooms! In person, or online, it’s all the same to me! I just love to do it! I’m linking up with Ashley and Angie for #2getherwearebetter and with Blog Hoppin’ for a classroom reveal- Melonheadz style! Last year I went with a ... Read More about Classroom Tour {2015-2016}

Summary: The spelling matrix can be adapted to suit any year level/any class. It is designed to provide students with a range of activities that will help to develop their skills in spelling. The matrix is aligned to Blooms Taxonomy as well as Gardner’s multiple Intelligences. The use of the matrix allows students to take […]