February Freebies Galore!

February is such a fun month in elementary school, even in the upper elementary grades. You can do all sorts of activities with the holidays in February as well as create fun winter lessons. Learning doesn't have to be sacrificed in the name of fun, either, as you'll soon discover! Over the last few years, I've created loads of free resources for February that I'd like to share with you now.

You can find all of these freebies and more on my Seasonal Activities page during the month of February or my Laura's Best Freebies page all year round.

February Activities Mini Pack
This 25-page packet offers ready-to-use lessons and activities for February that foster higher level thinking while motivating students. Activities include math word problems, a candy heart fraction lesson, a friendship poetry activity, a word challenge, and directions for writing a President or Black History biography. The February Activities Mini Pack is offered for free as a sample of my Seasonal Activities Bundle. It's free for subscribers of Candler's Classroom Connections; click here to sign up for your free copy.

Chinese New Year Activities
The Chinese New Year takes place in January during some years and in February during others. No matter when it occurs, you'll love these two literacy activities to use during this special event. Both were designed to be completed by kids working in cooperative learning teams, but they would work equally well with partners. The first lesson is a sorting activity in which cards with facts about the Chinese and American New Years are placed on a Venn diagram. The second involves discussion cards to use with Sam and the Lucky Money. Download this freebie from my Seasonal Activities page on Teaching Resources during January and February, or from my Laura's Best Freebies page any time of the year.

Black History Character Bios
During February, many classrooms celebrate Black History month. Students often research famous African Americans and write a report or share the information in some way. Unfortunately, many students don't know how to research, organize, and write a report and do far too much copying and pasting. The Character Trait Bio activity is a little different from the normal writing assignment because students are asked to organize their essays around character traits which makes plagiarism almost impossible. This is activity is a sample from my Character Bio Reports Mini Pack.



You can download any of these freebies from my from my Seasonal Activities page on Teaching Resources during February, or from my Laura's Best Freebies page any time of the year. I hope your students enjoy these engaging activities and learn a little something along the way!

Heartfelt Causes & Effects

Last week I read an adorable book called Somebody Loves You, Mr. Hatch. I couldn't believe that it was published over 20 years ago! It's about a lonely man who receives a Valentine candy heart with a card that says, "Somebody loves you." His whole demeanor changes and, as a result, he develops many friendships. But then he finds out that the candy heart was a mistake, and he reverts to his former quiet self. Of course the story has a happy ending, but you'll have to read the book to find out what happens!

Anyway, as I was reading the book, I thought about how our words and actions can impact others in both positive and negative ways. A smile or a kind word can go a long way to brighten someone's day. I wanted to create a reading lesson to go along with the story, and I thought it would be the perfect text for exploring cause and effect - both in the book and in our own lives.

So I created the Heartfelt Causes & Effects graphic organizer from the Cause and Effects Rocket graphic organizer in my newest ebook, Graphic Organizers for Reading: Teaching Tools Aligned with the Common Core. First, students find three different cause and effect situations in the story. Then they write each cause on one rocket's flame and its effect on the body of the rocket. The rocket theme helps them understand cause and effect relationships because the exhaust (or flame) released from the end of the rocket makes the rocket move forward.

In addition to creating the graphic organizer, I wrote a complete lesson for using Somebody Loves You, Mr. Hatch with your students. Click the title of the book to find it on Amazon where you can review the reviews and learn more about it. Download the entire lesson with printables from the Seasonal page on Teaching Resources during February or any time of the year from Laura's Best Freebies, a page with over 75 freebies of my very best free resources for teachers. I hope you enjoy the lesson!






Disclaimer: This post includes an Amazon affiliate links at no cost to you.

Valentine Hearts Math Investigation

Have you ever wondered whether all boxes of Valentine hearts candies are the same? Do they have the same colors? Do they weigh the same amount? Does each box contain the same number of candies? Inquiring minds want to know! Questions like these provide a perfect opportunity for a bit of data analysis fun!

A few years ago I posed these questions to my 4th graders and decided to investigate. With the class divided into cooperative learning teams, we examined 10 different boxes of candy. We weighed them and looked at the range, mode, median, and mean of the data. Then we counted the candies, graphed the colors, and crunched the numbers to look at the variations between the boxes. As you can see from the partially completed class data chart in this post, you'll end up with lots of data in a short time that's perfect for also sorts of mathematical analysis.

It was a terrific activity for the week of Valentine's Day because they were definitely stretching their brains, but they were having lots of fun, too! This activity would also work well AFTER Valentine's Day when you can snap up boxes of conversation hearts at cheap prices. Your students won't mind a bit if Valentine's Day has already passed!

Where to Download the Valentine Data Analysis Freebie
You can find this free Valentine Hearts Data Analysis packet on my Seasonal Page on Teaching Resources during the month of February. All of the files are stored in a large zip file, which you'll need to download and unzip to access the individual files. If the activity is not on the Seasonal page, you can find it on Laura's Best Freebies, a private page on my website with over 75 of my best free resources for teachers. Here's what you'll find inside the file:

• Smartboard slides for recording and analyzing data (not required for the lesson)
• Promethean board conversion from the Smartboard file above
• Student samples of how our class results were recorded and analyzed
• Teacher directions including student activity pages

Kids love to have candy on Valentine's Day, and this is a fun way to sneak in a little learning at the same time! If you don't want your students to eat the candies they've handled for the activity, be sure to purchase some extra boxes for snacking after the lesson is over. Yum!