Catholic Schools Week UPDATED

Gearing up for Catholic Schools Week I thought I would share some of my favorite Religion projects I have done this year and in the past!

I had been searching EVERYWHERE to get a Catholic version of the Ten Commandments Phone I saw all over the place.  I just couldn't seem to find it and it was very confusing for my kids to see one thing in their Religion books and then another in the activity, so I created one that perfectly aligns to the Catholic Bible!  If you are interested in this activity click the pictures below!

This created the most amazing hallway display!!  I just found an image online and had my aide trace them onto large pieces of construction paper, white printer paper, and some yarn...voila!  The kids looked in magazines for the letters to the acrostic poem and we brainstormed words that described our Catholic School!

We have really been trying to get our students to actually utilize their Bibles!  This is a great activity for any time of the year (we actually did it around Christmas), but would be great during Advent, Lent, and even Easter!  The kids first used their Bibles to look up the verses and find the name(s) of Jesus in each verse.  Then as a follow up activity each child selected a name and did an illustration.  If you are interested in snagging a copy just click either picture below!

As we get closer to Catholic Schools' Week please come back and check out how I have updated this post to include more fun!!!

UPDATE NUMBER ONE

One theme to Catholic Schools' Week is to show our appreciation to our families for supporting our school.  The students are going to write thank-you letters and we needed some stationary to match!  This is FREE on TeachersPayTeachers!

UPDATE NUMBER TWO

Keeping in theme with the family appreciation we added something new to our calendar this year that EVERYONE is raving about!  Family Picnic Day!!!  Of course it is January and today was a high of 28 so it was an inside picnic, but still.  As a parent and a teacher it was great to get a glimpse of the pros for all parties......no work on the teachers part, except sending home an invite and super motivating for the students!  My kindergartner asked all weekend when her picnic was!  Basically each grade level had a picnic one day during the week. We doubled up so it was K with 5th, 1st with 4th and so on so that there weren't too many parents in the cafeteria at once.  The kids ate at their regular time and either brought a packed lunch or families brought in something special.  It was easy peasy!!  Here is me and my little one....of course she got McDonald's!  I have included an example of our invites.  The CSW logos can be found at https://www.ncea.org/csw .

Another thing we did this week that went along with our religion chapter but was also great for CSW because it allowed the kids to get up and move was Fruits of the Spirit posters.  Each child found 9 pictures, one for each fruit and wrote a caption.  It opened up great discussions about what are examples of gentleness, patience, etc.  Again, so easy for such a packed week!

 STAY TUNED!

Easter .... a tad tardy {FREEBIES}

Ok I know that Easter was almost two weeks ago, however I teach at a Catholic school and we celebrate the SEASON of Easter.  Therefore, for the next month or so this is still relevant...he he! Before Easter we emphasis Lent and discuss Jesus and what amazing things he did during his time on Earth. We use this Lent pack to help us learn about this special preparation time.

We also have high school students make resurrection egg stories and come down to present them with the children.

We also had fun with some graphing and tally mark practice using jelly beans! These printables came from Simply Kinder and I copied them two to one page.  Click on the picture to grab yourself a FREE copy from her TPT store.

The following activity we had already made 1-100 number cards for a previous activity so this was super easy!  I put a few cards in a bucket on each table pod and the kids simply picked three cards and ordered them from least to greatest.  This is a FREE pack from Sparkles, Smiles, and Successful Students.  Click on either picture to head to her TPT store and grab yourself a copy.

 When the kids came back from Easter/Spring break I wanted to be sure we still discussed the true meaning of Easter with this great read aloud and craftivity.  You can click on the picture below to grab a FREE copy of the words and the egg.  

We also read the Tale of Peter Rabbit and reviewed cause and effect!

We read The Best Easter Eggs Ever!  Which is an ADORABLE book.  We have been talking about adjectives for quite sometime so they decorated an egg and wrote adjectives to describe their egg on the back.

After we read The Tale of Peter Rabbit we read a book to compare and contrast called Muncha, Muncha, Muncha by Candace Fleming.  This book was SO FUN to read and there are two sequel books too!  I forgot to grab a copy of the compare and contrast chart that we made, but it was perfect.  The printable I used came from Kathi at Primary Possibilities.  You can see the pack in her TPT store by clicking below.