Australia Map

A good idea for learning geography. Requires some drawing skill, a big table and a small number of kids to start off with. Kids work together to draw native animals and land marks they know about. They also use an atlas to locate and name the capital cities. This activity can be transferred to any country!

Thank You!

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New Book

Introducing my new eBook available for purchase from amazon.com just click on the link. Only US$1.50!

2D Theater

Here is an activity I stumbled across while planing my Drama/Theatre week. It is good for those kids that are creative but don't necessarily want to perform in front of crowds.

Simply print out the cut out here.

The end result is really limited by your imagination. Below is the one I created as an example for my group.

In case you were wondering here is the story that goes with it:

Once upon time and long ago there was a kingdom. The kingdom was a marvellous place, the whether was good, the soil fertile, the king was kind and the queen was beautiful. Everybody led happy lives. Well, nearly everybody. Not far away enough lived a vicious and blood thirsty dragon. He continually killed the farmer's sheep that lived on the outskirts of the realm. 

One day the farmers got together and petitioned the king for action.

"One day all our sheep will be gone, then he will eat us!" yelled one farmer.

"Once he is finished with us he will come after you!" yelled another.

The king knew something needed to be done so he got together all the smartest minds in his kingdom and they had a brainstorming session on what is to be done.

"Maybe we raise an army and kill it?" considered the army general.

"We could try and scare it off." suggested the head jester.

"We should just move, there is no point" lamented the leader of the pessimists society.

"I know what we can do!" chirped a young voice. The whole court turned to face the noise and found a young girl. "My mum is the best cook in the kingdom, her speciality is Satay Tofu. We can try and convince the dragon to eat that instead"

The king, who wasn't a fan of any of the other ideas, decided the young girl's idea was a winner.

They put a large tray of satay tofu out for the dragon. The dragon spotted it and gobbled it all up. "That is quite nice" the dragon belched.

From that day forward the dragon was a vegetarian. The kingdom was saved. The farmers were happy and the little girl's family became quite rich with all the orders of satay tofu ordered and paid for by the king.

THE END

Stain Glass Windows

A great activity for the start of Spring/Summer with daylight savings providing more light! If you are in the northern hemisphere save this one for six months.

Materials Needed

• Cellophane - Different colours
• Coloured paper
• Scissors
• Glue
• Markers

Method

1.   On your piece of coloured paper draw some random shapes. Make sure these shapes are easy to cut out and are spaced evenly apart.
2. Cut out your shapes.
3. Using the cellophane cover and glue over the cut outs.
4. Hang it up on a window that gets plenty of sunshine.

Front

Back

Desired Effect

1. 
   

Paper Owl

Materials

• Coloured Paper
• Scissors
• Glue
• Circle to trace

Method

1. Trace a circle on coloured paper.
2. Fold two edges inward to make a sort of shallow 'V' shape, these are the wings-DO NOT GLUE
3. Get a different coloured piece of paper and cut to fit under the wing, decorate  to show feathers or use glitter.
4. Now glue the 'wings' down.
5. Using coloured paper add detail such as a beak, eyes and legs.
6. One idea is to trace three different sized circles, to make three different sized owls, and make a mobile. This is what I initially wanted to do but I ran out of time.

Toilet Roll Space Ship

Materials

• Aluminium Foil
• Toilet Roll
• Glue
• Paper- Coloured
• Markers/Pencils
• Cardboard from cereal box

Method

1. Cut out wing flaps, these will go on the sides of the rocket, from the cereal box card. Also make a cone to go on top from the same material.
2. Cut slits on the toilet roll to fit the wing flaps into.
3. Cover the wing flaps, the cone cover and the toilet roll in aluminium foil.
4. Make sure you cut the aluminum covering the slits in the toilet roll before you insert the wing flaps.
5. Decorate with windows and rocket fire.