Amazing, Astonishing, and Academic Adjectives

 Adjectives lend themselves to an array of engaging and rigorous activities...WHO could resist all this descriptive fun.  I wanted to start off with giving my students some experience into the wide range of adjectives.  We created a flip book and decided on the categories as we went along.  The kids were just about to jump out of their seats with descriptive words so we switched up our procedures for this one.  I put 3-5 minutes on the timer and we all just fired away tossing out adjectives that would fit well in the particular category.  There were some sections that had over 50 words!!!  Another super motivator was having the students count how many they had written down!

   

 After getting our feet wet with the variety of adjectives out there, I brought out one of my favorite activities of all time!  I have used this bag in Kindergarten, First, and Third!  We start the lesson by adding adjectives that appropriately describe the gift bag.  Throughout the lesson the students were so excited to see what was actually inside!  The students also recorded them on their sheet.  We then had some real fun by FINALLY getting to see what was in this mystery bag! 

POP ROCKS

After the students and I finished making our individual word webs, I knew the revelation of what was inside the bag would create a bit of organized chaos.  In order to keep the students focused on the task I shared the pen for a chart we make collaboratively to describe the pop rocks outside and inside!

 This was another activity that I loved from teaching a different grade.  I wished there had been more time for the students to get actual photographs of their bedrooms for the visual part of this assignment.  Nonetheless, it turned out great!  The assignment to describe their bedrooms not only served as a grammar activity, but also a writing one as well.

 Culminating our studies, the students chose some personality adjectives to describe themselves.  Vocabulary, writing, art all wrapped into one!! You can snag a free copy of the personality adjectives below!

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.

Amazing Authentic Adjectives

We started working on adjectives at least three weeks ago and I have been compiling all of our studies to share with you in one great post!!  I hope you will find some ideas that are new and you can use with your class.   We started off using the AMAZINGLY TALENTED Babbling Abby author of the Inspired Apple's Pop Rockin' Adjectives Pack!  Click either picture to take you to her TPT store to grab yourself a copy!

     

Luckily, I am the person at all the parties that creeps over the gift bags and tissue paper JUST in case the guest of honor doesn't want to take them home...I am there to save the day!  I dug around in my tote and found one fitting that would have many descriptive words.

   

The next day the kids were SOOOO excited to see what was in the bag!  We described the bag, the rocks, eating the rocks and all of the adjective goodness!  The kids had a lot of fun with this activity.

      

Another engaging and physical activity we did was with a partner.  I cut some pictures from magazines and then the kids rotated around the room to each picture.  They were asked to each write an adjective describing the pictures and to not duplicate any words already on the sheet.  I believe this was a very effective activity for them to deepen their understanding of what an adjective is and not use nouns!

We also incorporated comparative and superlative adjectives which I talked about a bit more on my No Worksheet Wednesday post which you can see HERE!

One of our cumulative projects we did was even more exciting than I had anticipated.  The kids were asked to do a descriptive writing project about their bedroom.  We usually have weekly homework sent home Monday and due Friday but I knew the picture would be more work.  I sent the directions home Monday instead of our weekly homework and had it due the following Monday.  The success of this project was time, love, and creativity!  The kids all did such a good job and it was fun to see their personalities in their rooms.  I am sure the parents appreciated that they probably cleaned their rooms without a fuss too.  I do not have a direct link to where I found this idea but it is credited to Misha Frander.

Hopefully you were able to get some fresh ideas for teaching those tricky adjectives to your kids and getting them to use them as well!!  

No Worksheet Wednesday #3 and FREE HEART PUZZLE

We are at it again!!  Challenges ourselves and other primary teachers to go worksheet free!  Read on to see a couple activities we did that were worksheet free!  Click below to head to the Primary Chalkboard and see the other ideas or link up!

The past couple of weeks we have been working on adjectives (I hope to share all our studies in one big post at a later date).  For now, I will share two activities that truly made my teacher heart happy.

Firstly,  I usually do a lot of thinking and connecting before I teach a lesson.  I go through the processing and steps for myself to get the ideas to the kids and then also what I want my kids to get out of it.  THEN, there are other times when I just wing activities and all the pieces fall into place and I go AH-HA I DO KNOW WHAT I AM DOING!!!  I love that affirmation - - - especially as a newbie teacher!

To extend our adjective study we began talking about comparative and superlative adjectives with a fun interactive smartboard file from Lisa Rombach from TPT and the best part is it is FREE and she has a lot more of them!  Click the picture below to get yourself a copy!

I wrote simple verbs on sticky notes and stuck them to the board then gathered some construction paper.  I let the kids pick a paper and a word then had to write and illustrate the base word, the comparative form, and superlative form.

This kid is clever!  ha ha!

It is hard to read in the picture, but this kid was also pretty creative.  The baby is fast, the 12th grader is faster, and Dad is fastest!

Clean is a hard adjective to illustrate....LOVED this one!

The following really made my teacher heart happy because we are also currently working on a habitat research project - - Antartick (love her inventive spelling) and Tundra made it on their pages!!!!

For the Lenten season one of our focuses has been God's gifts and our eternal debt to him.  I made up a quick puzzle heart and had the kids write gifts God has given them.  Then they were to cut the pieces and get with a partner to switch pieces, discuss, and put back together.  They did an AMAZING job and the puzzle was actually the PERFECT amount of challenge for them.

Click the picture to get a FREE copy of the puzzle heart!