Tar Beach : C (Dragonfly Books)

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First Second Grade Lesson

Make a Tar Beach Quilt

The Teacher makes a drawing of a stick figure girl with a dress. This will be used later with the entire class to fill in the main character's name, thoughts, feelings, and actions. Her name will be written on her dress. Her thoughts will be written beside her head. Her feelings will be written close to her heart. Her actions will be listed close to her feet. This will be done on a large sheet of chart paper and placed in an area of the room so that it will be visible to all of the class, and so that it can be used when discussing these parts of the story.

Take a picture walk through the book, Tar Beach by Faith Ringgold. Predict what we think the book will be about. Read the book, Tar Beach, aloud together. Predicting what will happen next while reading.

On a map of New York state first locate New York City, then Manhattan and finally the George Washington Bridge (which connects New Jersey and New York). This bridge was built in 1931 and is one of the first suspension bridges in the United States.

Two Activities to match this book are found on CDROM # 4

-Sequence Sentence Strips (1-3)
Sentence strips that match the story, The Missing Beach Ball. You can place these in a pocket chart and have your students place them in the correct order or you may choose to use these to retell the story to your students.

- Clifford and The Beach Ball Retell Fill In The Blank
Student activity sheet. Student uses word bank to fill in the blanks of a retell. This would make a great follow-up activity to the pocket chart sentence strip sequence above.(1-3)

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Book this book in your Listening Center - Click to learn more!

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Print Bookmarks

If you are creating a beach theme in your classsroom, here is a perfect book for you to read to your class.

After reading the story, have the students retell the story. Have them sort the pictures of what the old lady swallowed first, second, & third.
Click here to download the pictures of the items the lady swallowed. Print, cut, and laminate them before you use them.

Have students create an Old Lady that they can use to act out the story. Use a ziploc baggie for the belly and have the students draw the pictures of the items the lady swallowed.

Use vocab cards in your pocket chart for your students to refer to when writing about this story in their journals.
Click here to download the cards that match the story.

Click here to download a write and draw activity to match this book.

shares the Jelly Fish Craft!

*Pretend to "sunbathe" on large sheets of paper "towels" (use large newsprint or grocery bags but to lie flat.) Help children to feel comfortable to make designs on the paper that will become their "towels". They can even draw "Me" pictures on their paper and outline their bodies by helping each other. Children can decorate their "Me Towels" by using markers, crayons etc.  They might even cut and paste real material scraps for bathing suits.

Check out Just For Fun to learn how you can make this hand and foot lobster! I am in love wuth this cute idea!!!

* Sea Shells! Write the words BIG and LITTLE on two pieces of paper. Children can sort shells accordingly. Draw a sample size to help non-readers. Set out a book of shells so older children can find matches. Very young children will simply enjoy examining the shells. Talk about the colors of shells and how the sun has bleached them.

Check out Teaching Two to see how to make these cool castles.

Hawaiian Beach Scenes:
Give the children each a sheet of light blue construction paper. Let them make "beaches" by brushing glue across the bottoms of their papers and sprinkling sand on the glue  (use white sand, if available). Then let them glue on small shells and precut sun shapes, palm tree shapes, beach ball shapes, etc. to complete their beach scenes

End of The Year Beach Gift Set:

Buy a Sand Pail and Fill it with Learning Activities for your Students

-Teaching Heart Summer Game Board - Practice Any Skill

-Fruit Snacks and a Sorting Sheet

-Beach Book

Make Edible Beach

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2 (20 oz.) pkgs. GOLDEN Oreo cookies 1/2 stick butter 1 (8 oz.) cream cheese 1 c. powdered sugar 3 1/2 c. milk 2 sm. French vanilla instant pudding boxes 1 (12 oz.) Cool Whip Cream the butter, cream cheese and powdered sugar together. Mix pudding together with the milk, add the Cool Whip to pudding mixture. Then blend in with the cream cheese mixture. Crumble the Oreo's in a blender, leave the cream in the Oreo's. Use a sand pail to fill with your yummy treat. Alternating cookie crumbs and filling, ending with the cookie crumbs on top. Top with a sand shovel for serving.

The dollar stores have out all of their summer fun treats; like, BEACH BALLS! Here are a few ideas of ways to use those beach balls.

1.) Write out the numbers on the top and bottom sections. Throw the ball gently to a child and they have to add the numbers where there thumbs are.

2.) Another game is to sit in a circle and count to a specific number. Whoever says that number has to go to the center of the circle. Keep going till there are two left. Everyone yells showdown and they play till we we have a winner . I have done this with counting by 2's, 5's, 10's, days of the week, months, etc. Easy and quick and they really like it a lot!

3.) Today my son and I tried to see how many times we could throw it to each other without dropping it. We set a timer for one minute to see how many times we could throw it to each other.

4.) Like musical chairs, but with a beach ball. Pass the ball around the circle, when the music stops the person holding the ball is out!

5.) Write your child's site words on the ball. Through the ball to your child, whatever their right hand is on is the word they need to read.

6.)

9.) Read a Beach Ball Book to your kiddos

_____ Grade Was a Ball! - Cover a bulletin board with a "beachy" background. Include a sun, water, and sand. Bounce around a beach ball one day in class and discuss what a "ball" the year has been. As you pass the ball to a each student have them discuss what they liked best about the year. Then cut out large circles for everyone in your class. Have the students color the white balls to resemble a beach ball. After they have colored their ball, have them place a piece of white lined paper in the center of the ball. Have the students write about their favorite experience in grade ____. Then place the balls onto the beach scene.

Make a Beach Ball Bead Craft With Your Class
The Teaching Heart End of the Year Packet has a few ideas to use with a Beach or Beach Ball Theme!

Beach Ball Add & Subtract Facts Memory

To Play:  Played like old fashion memory.  Break your students into teams of 2-4.  Your students mix the cards up and then lay the cards face down in rows.  To play they take turns in a clockwise fashion.  The first student turns over a card and then turns over another card.  If they make a match, they keep the cards and go again until they do not make a match.  If they don’t make a match, the next person goes.  Play until all the cards are gone.  The student with the most cards wins.

All materials need to make this center are found in the End of the Year Packet

Beach Ball Color a Rhyme

Page one is yours to read.  Give page two to the students in your class.  Read each one and have students volunteer the color word that fits the rhyme.  Then the class may color in the correct number of colored balls on their page.  When you are finished reading each little rhyme, you can evaluate how well your students were listening by being sure they colored the balls the correct color.

All materials need to make this center are found in the End of the Year Packet