Thankful Mayflower boats

We read a few Thanksgiving books and then created small Mayflower boats out of cardboard, the sails listed what children were thankful for.

Materials:
brown cardboard strips (from box), stapler, brown construction paper, black and brown markers, Dixie cups, Popsicle sticks, Elmer's glue, white paper, pencils, scissors

Steps:
1.  Build a cardboard frame out of a strip of cardboard, you could also use milk cartons
2.  Cover the frame in glue
3.  Wrap the frame in construction paper (making sure there was a bottom for the Dixie cup)
4.  Draw "wooden" boards and windows on our ships
5.  Turn the Dixie cup upside down and cut a slit in the top
6.  Insert the Popsicle stick mast
7.  Write our thankful items on the white paper and cut it out
8.  Attach it to the mast


Extension(s):  the children can also create Pilgrims to ride the ship,  write about the activity from a historical event perspective, as a "how to" paper, or a fiction story from a Pilgrim's perspective

 

Biography TImelines

A quick and easy way to separate main idea and details, while reading biographies and learning about the genre, is to create a timeline of a person's life.  This also solidifies the idea of chronological order, has children return to text to seek out information, and gives them the opportunity to learn about an influential person. 

Here are a few examples of timelines of Walt Disney's life, based on one particular biography, but we did additional research using other sources also.

Younger children or children with limited English can simply draw big events and perhaps label them, while older children can additionally write about the person's life, highlighting their accomplishments.

Violet the Pilot

Violet the Pilot by Steve Breen is a wonderful book for teaching about children being different because of their interests, while encouraging the idea of girls achieving feats in male dominated areas.  It's a fun story of a creative heroine who builds her own flying machines from junkyard scraps.

After we read, the students created their own blueprint designs of an airplane or flying machine that they would create with common household objects or discarded items. These were based on the blueprints on the end pages of the book.  They labeled the diagrams and then went on to write a story about an adventure in their flying machine.

Materials:  a copy (or multiple copies) of Violet the Pilot, white colored pencils, dark blue paper or construction paper

Character Summaries

To look at characters in a book, this activity can be tweaked for various levels and analysis of characters (events, character traits, appearances, etc).

Take a large piece of paper and fold each side in so that it meets in the middle.  Choose two characters from the story (the protagonist and antagonist are easy to work with).  On the inside, choose a scene, or the students can choose a scene, in which the two characters interact.

The example below is from fourth graders who read the Roald Dahl book The Twits.  They each drew Mr. and Mrs. Twit on the opposing cover flaps.  On the interior they choose one or two jokes that the Twits played on one another, illustrated, and described them in writing.

Sequencing

Two literacy extension activities the we have done recently are sequencing, during and after reading books.  With older students, I give them Post It notes or index cards to keep track of major events in books.  With younger students, I keep track of the events (though we discuss them as a group), on chart paper or a sequencing map.  When we are finished reading, the students retell the events orally and in writing, and illustrate the sequence.

Examples of students' work from their respective reading groups:

A series of pictures from a second grader showing the Saguaro Cactus life cycle,
as shown in A Cactus Hotel.

After reading Abe Lincoln's Hat, a fourth grader took three major events
from the beginning, middle, and end of the story, described them
and drew illustrations.

Chocolate Covered Strawberry Mice

Here is a fun snack to make after reading The Little Mouse, The Red Ripe Strawberry, and The Big Hungry Bear, by Don and Audrey Wood.

They can be made with young children, though the decorating may need a steadier hand.  There are variations on this activity.  I have seen the mouse ears made with leaves from the strawberry (though then they're not edible).  Licorice lace is a fun variation on the tail, however, it has been hard to find in the stores lately!  

Not our best attempt but fun to make!

Ingredients and materials:

Strawberries, dipping chocolate, raisins (or candy) for ears, icing tube for decorating, wax paper, baking sheet

1. To make the mice, you can leave the strawberry intact, or cut off the top with the greens.
2. Prepare any decoration/mouse part that needs to be affixed with the chocolate.  For instance, I use raisins for ears, so I cut them in half beforehand.  
3. Melt the chocolate (I cheat and use Dolce's Dipping Chocolate found in the produce section of our local grocery stores).
4. Dip the strawberries one at a time and lay them on a baking sheet (it helps to put down wax paper or parchment paper first).
5. Affix mouse parts to wet chocolate.
6. When the chocolate is dry, use icing to decorate the rest of it.