Fun Ideas for Read Across America

Read Across America began as a celebration of Dr. Seuss, but if you want to go beyond Seuss in your celebrations, or you have older kids who aren’t into his books anymore, there are lots of things you can do.

Diary of a Not So Wimpy Teacher has a full week of free activities planned, including a STEM day, rock day, pajama day, tourist day and doughnut day. Kids could dress up for some of these, and they include a book (and a list of other books) to read as a class and other activities related to the theme. So fun!

Check out Your Thrifty Co-Teacher’s ideas for Read Across America in upper elementary that include things like reading buddies, book tastings (we’ll get back to that one in a minute), designing your own book jackets and more.

Erin Waters EDU has some more good ideas like exploring different genres of books, having a book fair by unique trait (such as books all by women or people of color or who write stories about aliens) or setting up a literary scavenger hunt.

There are lots more great ideas at Buzzing with Ms. B. I love the idea of having kids make bookmarks or doing a March Madness style bracket (or even just voting) to discover the kids’ favorite book. You could ask each child for their (one of several) favorite book they read last year, or use books you’ve read in the classroom.

Draw your own or grab one from Novel Effect.

And I mentioned book tastings above, which I know I’ve talked about before, but also check out this post from I Love First Grade about doing a “reading restaurant” that is a little bit the opposite of the way I’ve seen it done before because here the kids are “reserving” the kinds of books they’d like to read and the teacher picks out some books for them to sample, rather than having the kids report on a book. But either way would be fun.

Do you do anything special for Read Across America? I’d love to hear about it.

[Photo via Your Thrifty Co-Teacher]

10 Christmas Themed Young Adult Books

Remembrance Day (marked as Veterans Day in the United States) is Nov. 11, and it marks the end of hostilities in World War I. Poppies are a traditional symbol of the day because it is said they were the first flower to grow again on the battlefields, which inspired a famous poem. Let’s check out some poppy crafts you can make with your kids as part of a World War I unit or for Remembrance Day.

This pretty poppy craft from Krokotak just requires the printable, some crayons, scissors and glue. The printable includes the center of the flower and kids can draw the outside as well as adding stem.

Glued to My Crafts has a printable for a torn paper poppy, or you could color or paint this one as well.

Use torn or cut pieces of paper to make these poppy suncatchers from Red Ted Art.

Happy Hooligans has a bunch of great poppy crafts but I particularly like the painted rocks and easy paper plate poppy.

Crafty Morning has a cute poppy craft made with fingerprints, which is quick and easy to do with kids of any age.

Older kids and adults can make these folded paper poppies from Chica and Jo, but they do involve hot glue and floral wire, which can be sharp, so it’s not for young kids. An easier paper poppy that only calls for regular craft glue can be found at Sugar Spice and Glitter. This one also has a printable template to make it easier.

These felt poppies from One Little Project also use a glue gun and a sewing needle, but they’re so pretty I couldn’t resist sharing them for older kids. Add a pipe cleaner stem or turn them into pins to wear for remembrance events. Check out their coffee filter poppy craft for a great option for younger kids.

Have you read?

Leave a Reply