The Night Before the Snow Day

 Are you or your "kids" (students or your actual children) anticipating or wishing for a snow day? If so, this post is for you! 

My kids and I read The Night Before the Snow Day by Natasha Wing. We talked about superstitions like putting pajamas on backwards, doing snow dances, and even putting ice cubes in the toilet. 

I decided to make some activities that I could see being used by:

• homeschoolers with kids at different levels
• classroom teachers
• substitutes
• teacher candidates for reading demo lessons that showcase differentiation

These lessons can also be done:

• during virtual learning -  independently while asynchronous or as a class or with partners
• on paper - options for writing or cutting

Like all of my Google Doc lessons, there is a linked table of contents that makes navigation easy as well as an answer key and differentiated pages!

The Ballad of Valentine

 Looking for a great upper elementary picture book read aloud for Valentine's Day? We read The Ballad of Valentine by Alison Jackson. 

This book is set to the tune of an 1884 song titled "Oh My Darling, Clementine." A young man writes a ballad chronicling his attempts to let a young woman named Valentine know he's interested in her. The story flows well, especially due to the meter and rhyme.

There are many opportunities to discuss different ways of communication before technology overtook the ones the young man tried:

• mailed letters via post office
• sent a note through trained homing pigeon
• used smoke signals from a bonfire
• tapped a message with Morse code
• rented a mail car
• paid a rider on a pony 
• wrote a message by airplane
• tied a message to a boulder

Activities to do with the book could include:

• determining cause and effect
• researching the history of the U.S. Post Office, homing pigeons, Morse code, The Pony Express, etc.
• adding other ways the man could have communicated with Valentine, such as sign language, email, phone call, text message, etc.
• differentiate which forms of communication were used in the past vs more modern ones

I recommend this book as a fun Valentine's Day activity for grades 3-5. Click the image above or this link to download the Google Doc.

Can You Say Peace?

The International Day of Peace (or World Peace Day) is celebrated annually on September 21. It is devoted to strengthening the ideals of peace, both within and among all nations and peoples.

The book Can You Say Peace? by Karen Katz teaches kids a few ways to say the word "peace" in a few different languages. Because it's pretty basic, we took it up a notch and created a Google Earth project to show the countries mentioned in the book.

Click here for the Google Earth project. Get exploring! Want a challenge for your students? Have them add other countries as well as the languages and recordings of their pronunciations. 

Here is a list from the last page of the book:

Check out these songs about peace.

A Song of PEACE for Kids by Jack Hartman

Peace, Love, + Kindness by Bari Koral

Find a word search to print here.