Teaching And Home Schooling Ideas

Make sentences or silly sentences from flash cards. You could write them out, punctuating correctly. Next time we will extend them with connectives. Add your own words to cards as you think of new words for your sentences.

We read Superworm by Julia Donaldson and Axel Scheffler. On A4 paper I drew an oval shape in the centre and wrote the questions, What is Superworm like!? What does Superworm do? After we read the story Thomas drew Superworm in the oval and then wrote phrases from the story about what Superworm was like and words to describe Superworm's characteristics. Eg long, strong, stretchy, wriggly, kind, caring, lots of friends, Wizard Lizard is his enemy, scared of crow, helps his friends, hero, super... You could also pick out what Superworm did in the story to help his friends. We found some stickers we had from the Superworm story and added them to the page.

After making our own marvellous medicine potion the other week, we have been reading George's Marvellous Medicine together. I wanted to get some writing out of this so I used a section of the story as a frame for Thomas to come up with some ideas of his own. He came up with some good descriptions and onomatopoeia words which we have also been looking at. (Onomatopoeia are words that sound like a noise or sound eg bang, clang, wham, ooze, pop, crackle etc) He even remembered an onomatopoeia alphabet song we had watched the week before on youtube. I also love how minecraft had to feature in it!

We love Roald Dahl's story George's Marvellous Medicine. Today we made our own version of the marvellous medicine. We started with the ingredients we'd used for our rain in a jar and then raided the pantry and bathroom cabinet for out of date items. (I was supervising all the time and I made  sure Thomas knew not to taste the mixture.) Thomas mixed the items in a bowl and I wrote the ingredients in a list as they were added to the concoction with amounts noted down. Whilst we mixed and squirted, added and stirred, we listened to the CD of George's Marvellous Medicine. We poured the mixture into a bottle and labelled with a homemade medicine label. This was a fun activity and lasted a long time and we both thoroughly enjoyed it. We intend to do some creative writing from this activity, so we will share when it's written.

Make a stickman or stickman family. We went for a walk and collected some sticks with legs!! We read the Stickman story. We used ribbon, stick on eyes, twigs, foam shapes, pom poms, feathers to make stickman and sticklady. Share your stickman and stickman family, we'd love to see them. 

Read Tabby McTat and look at the illustrations of Tabby in the book and how the cat is described. Pick out descriptions in the story. Draw picture of Tabby McTat in the box and colour in. Write a paragraph explaining that Tabby McTat is missing and a description of the cat. What does the cat look like? Any distinguishing features? Who is the cats owner and how do you contact if there is a sighting? Try to vary the starts of sentences as it's easy to start with he, his or Tabby. Use descriptive language and adjectives eg sparkling white eyes. Can you use any quotes from the story. Eg a miaow that is loud and strong. Hook the reader in with your first sentences. Use a question directed at the reader eg Have you seen this cat? Tell reader how to contact owner. Eg Find Fred at the lion statue. I got this sheet from the scholastic website but you can use A4 paper to create the poster with a box for the picture and lines for the description. You could even desig...

Learn spellings with a spelling dice game. Divide an A4 sheet into six columns. Draw one dice face at top of each column and put a different number on each dice face. Write words in the columns from your child's spelling list (could be reading list if your child is younger). We made this game a few years ago. To play, roll the dice. If you roll a one the other player takes the sheet and picks a word for the player to spell from the one column. If they spell it correctly they get a point. Take it in turns. If they spell the word wrong then look and talk about how they spelt it wrong and how to spell correctly. (Adult could get some wrong on purpose to talk about how to spell correctly.) If reading then pick a word for the child to read, get a point for reading correctly. Could tick words as read them.

Create a wooden spoon character. Decorate a wooden spoon as a character from a book and act out your favourite story or read along with the character. We have created a number of wooden spoon characters in the past (for our village produce show!) We have made Batman, Rapunzel and Ronaldo. Who is your favourite?

Paper plate animal crafts have always been a favourite in our house. Create your favourite animal on a paper plate. In the past we have made a tortoise, hare/rabbit, frog (at school), butterfly and lion. Use paint, felt tips, crayons or pieces of paper and glue or stickers, feathers, sequins etc You could read a favourite animal story then make the animal character. Use the animal plate to act out the story. Eg Read The Hare and the Tortoise - make tortoise and hare, then you could act out the story. Tortoise - We made the tortoise sticking on coloured paper for the shell and coloured card for the head, feet and tail. Read The Selfish Tortoise - make the tortoise. Hare - We made the hare sticking on coloured paper for fur, teeth, nose, ears and whiskers. Frog - Fold plate in half and paint. Cut out hand print for feet. Add a party blower for the tongue. Butterfly - Cut plate into butterfly shape and stick on sparkly sequins and shapes, we felt tipped on the ...

We read The Slimy Book by Babette Cole and noticed some of the sentences used alliteration and rhyme. Ask your child what alliteration is, if they don't know, it's when words in a sentence start with the same letter. Eg Spicy sausages sizzling. We found the alliteration in the book and also made up some sentences using alliteration. Dr Seus books use alliteration. Also tongue twisters eg Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers. You could get the children to write tongue twisters using alliteration. For younger children you could go through the alphabet. Eg Angry ants, barking bats, cowardly cat, etc We would love to hear any of your alliteration sentences, so please share.

We made our Elmer the elephant junk model a number of years ago. (Some of the tissue paper has faded.) We have now made it into a tealight lantern. Read an Elmer book with or to your child and look at the colourful pictures of Elmer.  To make Elmer you will need. A plastic washed milk carton Coloured tissue paper Glue White paper for eyes. Black pen Battery operated Tealight optional. An adult will need to cut the bottom off the milk carton and cut the handle so it looks like a trunk. Take top off the milk carton. Cut up coloured tissue paper - child can practice scissor skills or adult can cut out. Get your child to glue the coloured pieces on the milk carton. Cut out two circles for eyes and draw the eyes in black pen. Stick eyes on. Place tealight under to light up Elmer.