5 Seasonal Literacy Centers You Will...LOVE

Have you been to the Dollar Tree or through the Target $1.00 bins to check on the Valentine's Day goodies? I just can not get enough of them, and last week, I caught one of the first days after all the Valentine's day loot was put out. Imagine how the wheels were turning. Today, I will be sharing my creations with you as well as possible variations you might try.

Sightword Hearts for BANG!

The first activity I came up with uses plastic resin hearts and a sharpie pen. I took each of the hearts and wrote down commonly confused words as well as the word, "Bang". All of the hearts are placed in a bag, and the student chooses to pull out 1, 2, or 3 words. If he reads each word correctly, he keeps the hearts chosen. If he draws bang, all hearts go back into the bag. Play continues until one child reaches an agreed upon number.

Magnetic Hearts for Fluency Phrases

Don't you just love these adorable magnet hearts? On each magnet, I wrote out a fluency phrase. You can play swat with these using two flyswatters and teams. The teacher reads a phrase for the students to find and the first to hit it rereads it back. You could also just point at them and have the kids read them in a different voice too. And guess what??  They have shamrocks for March!

Mailboxes for Friendship Notes

During February, many of us will be encouraging friendships with our students. What better way to build each other up and build writing skills too than with a mail system. I saw these cute mailboxes, and I thought I'd hit the jackpot. They were $1.99 at Ollie's (not Dollar Tree). Even so, they will be a hit with the kids I work with, and I was thinking I'd try to use our die-cut machine to cut heart shaped notes. I grabbed both a boy box and a girl box, so neither would be upset. :-)

Comprehension Picks

With older students, we don't have as much time to work on sightwords and fluency, but these kids love seasonal fun too. I took these floral "heart" picks and heart shaped labels to add questions to each side of them. Students pull them from the jar, and they choose side one or side two to respond too.  I tried writing on them with the marker, but the ink smudged. ;-( Oh well, these turned out nicely too.

Sightword Window Statics

The last option I have for you didn't photograph very well, but it does give you a glimpse of the lingering snow in our yard. :-) Now...it is all GONE!  What you see here are window statics. With these, I put sightwords on them, and again, you could swat them, play I Spy, or I See. Do you see? 

So there you have my five Dollar Tree/Ollie's/Target finds, and I hope you like the ideas. You may find your kids need math centers too, and with a little creativity, you could easily change these up for math.

Before I say goodbye for the month, I thought I'd share a few resource options in my store that focus on friendship and could work well in centers too. The first is Kindness in the Classroom. It features the book, Each Kindness and includes a lapbook that you could have your kids gradually add to as the week goes. The second is a partner script for the primary grades called, Max and the Missing Valentine. It's geared to the primary grades and works very well for kids working with a buddy during Read to Partner or during guided reading. My Best Older Friend is one for the upper grades and helps children appreciate relationships with the elderly. The partner scripts have been a huge hit with my class, and I love the blend of fluency work and close reading strategies.

      

Well, hope you got a few ideas you love, and I hope you have an awesome month too.