Fun and Action in a Jar!

Here is a fun way to add a little action and diversion into your school day.

Just print off and color a label and tape it onto a can or jar.

Write a quick fun and active thing to do on slips of paper and fold them up and place them in the jar. Then as a child completes a problem or task, he or she picks a card and does what it says.

Months of the Year

When learning the order of the months of the year, I had a card for each month, and I spread out cards across the room, and as we sang a song to learn the months, the girls would hop to the next month.


Then I mixed up the cards and let them try to put them in order. It took a few tries before they could get them all in order.

Scramble! Sight Words and more

This activity is a fun way to practice sight words and other skills. We printed the sight words on lots of colored cards (circular) and scattered them around the room. Then I would call out a sight word and they would race to that word. 


You can do this with vocabulary, rhyming words, homonyms, synonyms & antonyms, math, States and Capitals, and so much more. 


Older children love it as much as younger ones do, but it gets a little more intense, and they have to be a little more careful or you may have some serious wipe outs as they race to be the first one to the card.

Sight Word Twister

Although we used this game for sight words, it could be adapted to any subject and any grade level. You could use this activity for vocabulary words, parts of speech, math, States and Capitals, and the list goes on.


How to make the Twister mat
Buy a large piece of heavy vinyl (at least 4x5 feet -- the larger the better). Then print out large cards (we used circles) with the sight words or other words for the subject you want to review. Place them under the vinyl so they are apart from each other in a regular pattern as shown in the picture. 


How to Play
Call out one of the words under the mat. Then the child has to place a hand or a foot on the correct word. As shown in the picture above, we printed each word twice, so more than one child could play at a time. You could use a twister spinner so you can tell them to use their right or left hand and foot. 


This was a favorite game to play and made reading sight words lots of fun.

Get Outside

 Get outside and let your children enjoy nature while they do their schoolwork. It's amazing what you can do when you're outside. Need to practice handwriting? Grab a stick and practice your letters in the sand or dirt. In the mood for art? Grab a paper and pencil, find a comfortable place to sit and draw what you see around you. Time to write? Nature is the perfect setting for getting those thoughts down on paper or describing the things you see or hear around you. 

 The artist at work.

 The writer in her realm.

These first three pictures show our older daughters when they were younger. The next pictures were taken of our younger daughters more recently.

Who says the you can only do your work on the computer at home? Take it outside and enjoy a change of scenery.

 Ever tried doing math on a swing? It's great fun.

 A picnic table or a camp chair provide 

interesting places to do schoolwork. 

So get outside and enjoy learning in the fresh air.

Kickball Review

Playing kickball is a fun way to review any subject. You can play it indoors with a foam ball or outdoors with a regular kickball. On the day we took these pictures we were reviewing math. For two children, we set it up so there were review questions at home base and second base. The person kicking picks a card, tells the answer, then the pitcher (mom) rolls the ball. They kick and run to first base. Then the next kicker does the same thing. Then the first player picks a card at 2nd base, answers it, and kicks the ball again. Having review questions at two bases makes it so that there is always someone who gets to kick. For more children, you could probably have the review questions only at home base. We had individual ziplock sandwich bags for each child (with an identifying sticker) with their specific review questions, at home base and 2nd base.

Jessica reads her review question at second base.