Martin Luther King and Black History Month

January is quickly approaching!  Prepare for Martin Luther King Day and Black History Month (Feb.) with the following resources. The books pictured above are great resources for your classroom library. 

You can find a reader's theater for Freedom on the Menu by Carole Weatherford here.  It is about a child who wants to eat a banana split in a drugstore, but can’t because she is not white. The author offers a great lesson plan on her website.  She uses a Langston Hughes poem, photographs, and links to Jim Crow Laws.  This book is based on the Greensboro Sit-Ins of 1960. Check out her entire Website!

Sarah Chauncey developed a wonderful website that is now archived.  You will find reader’s theaters, Ebook links, poetry links, and much more.   Download The Grandview Library’s Reader’s Theaters ppt. for grades K—3.  These are short and perfect for shared  reading.  A more lengthy play (Martin Luther King, Jr.,THE STORY OF A DREAM, a play by June Behrens)  and perfect for a school presentation can be found here. 

Several Ebooks on famous African Americans, including Martin Luther King can be found here.

An activity for middle grades and high school, If You had a Dream, can be found here.  Students rewrite portions of the speech into their own words.

PBS has a lesson plan for grades 9-12 using MLK’s I Have a Dream Speech here.

You can find several days of lesson plans, including resources here at Teachers.net.  This is an oldie, but a goodie! Lessons adapt well to balanced literacy.

The following were simply typed and made ready for print.  I am not the author.  They are available on many sites.

Download  "Colors" by Shel Silverstein Here

Download "I Am" an echo poem-author unknown

Download Choral Reading by Joan Nichols

Download Speech by Joan Nichols

More ideas:

ReadWorks has grade level comprehension passages!

Preschool Ideas...Wonderful resource!

Using your read-alouds, create a timeline of MLK's life!

Listen or Watch to Dr. King's speech

Writing Prompts 

Arts and Crafts activities to promote diversity

Unity Wreath Idea

Great activities from KidsActivites.net

Music and art

Black History Clipart...Free from Phillip Martin

Teaching Heart ideas

TLC Writing and Art Display (archived) Makes a great Classroom display!  You can see an example over at "Chalk Talk" of this activity, as well as many others.

And finally.....

Download Writing Page

My Dream for K-2

Download

Sandi

Country Christmas

I love this Santa that a local farmer creates every year.

  

Santa wishes you a Merry Christmas!

Snowmen at Christmas Writing Prompts

Snowmen at Christmas by Caralyn and Mark Buehner is such a fun book for sparking imagination in writing workshop!

 What would your snowman do at night while you are asleep?  Do they enjoy Christmas as much as we do?  

Here are two writing prompts to use with your class after you read the book!

Download here!

Counting Fives and Tens Free Now!

   

 






Hope you are ready for this last week of school!  This week you can download the Counting Fives and Tens at my TPT store.  I like to use cookie sheets and this adapts well.  Students can put the presents in order, then practice!
Hope you can find a use for this!   Download here!
Merry Christmas!

Sunshine Award

Thanks to Victoria Jasztal of Jasztalville: Where Inquiry and Creativity Rule, I have my first award!  This is super exciting!


Here are the rules for accepting this award:
1. Thank the person who gave this award and write a post about it.
2. Answer the following questions below.
3. And pass the award other fabulous bloggers, link their blogs and let them know you awarded them.
My answers to the questions:

• Favorite color?  Green
• Favorite animal? Dogs!  Especially Andy, Henry and Bella
• Favorite number? 3 for my three kids
• Favorite drink? Sweet tea and water
• Facebook or Twitter? Facebook!
• Your passion?  Books and teaching about books...literacy
• Giving or getting presents? Both. 
• Favorite day? Every Friday!

Here are the blogs that I am sending Sunshine to:

Mrs. Simpson's Kindergarten

She has been through a difficult time and needs some Sunshine!  She will be posting soon!

Watch.Read.Connect

Mr. Shu is a great resource.  He is a teacher-librarian who knows his books!  I love his book trailers.

I Love 2 Teach
Belinda has wonderful resources!  Daily 5, phonics, Literacy Centers, more...more...more!
First Grade Fanatics
Leslie and Erin have wonderful blog with plenty of ideas.  I love the idea of two teachers blogging together!

These may have already received the Sunshine Award, but who can't use a little more Sunshine!

Magical Message from Lita Judge, Author

I am excited to share a little background for the new book "red sled" by Lita Judge.    My last post was to share this little gem, and how happy I was to get it in the mail!  I quickly emailed the author to thank her for such a lovely book. With her permission, I want to share her response with you

Oh wonderful. I’m so happy you like it and thank you for writing!! It’s lovely to hear reader’s reactions. This story was a labor of love, something I think my imagination has been working on much of my life. 

When I was a little, I lived with my grandparents a lot in their old farm house in the Wisconsin woods. Our family had a tradition. If someone left the barn light on by mistake my grandfather proclaimed, “Alphonse must have done it.” If a mitten went missing, or a door was left open we all proclaimed, “Alphonse did it!” I grew up thinking this mischievous little character lived in a mythical cottage near our home. On wintry mornings I’d race outdoors to find tracks left in the snow by woodland animals and I’d search to see if I could find Alphonse’s tracks. I never did, but instead my imagination found a story. The little character in this story with the red hat is how I imagined Alphonse to look. Hope this story adds to your writing workshop.
I don’t think Alphe was really boy or girl, he/she was so mythical in my mind. But I went to sleep at night comforted by the fact that Alphe was out there somewhere, looking over things, even though Alphe seemed to create a lot of mischief. 
Thank you for writing.
Warmest wishes,
Lita


Thank you so much Lita for responding and sharing this wonderful story.  There is a lot of love on the pages of your new book!  I can't wait to share what our children learn from the "red sled" next month!