Showcase Your Classroom Creativity
Here are just a few ideas you may want to use in the classroom to showcase your childrens creativity and encourage them to learn more about their environment. Remember, well be happy to post you childrens work in the Gallery Area at http://www.missmaggie.org. Please visit the Gallery for submission instructions.
1. Find Joyce Kilmers poem about a tree and read the other tree poems on-line at http://www.missmaggie.org. Use these poems as inspiration to write your own. Post your poem with a tree you have made. Here are some ideas on how to create some beautiful trees.
a) To make a tree base: You may want to do a large rubbing of a tree trunk. You may want to use various brown materials and do a collage. You may want to use wood scraps.
b) To make the top: You may want to drip paint with various shades of green. You may want to sponge paint a top. You may want to overlay many leaf rubbings. Using fern leaves would be very pretty.
c) You may even want to make a tree puppet and present your poetry to another class.
2. Take a look at cartoons in newspapers, magazines and those in A Breath of Fresh Air with your classmates. Design a cartoon that focuses on one of the themes presented in A Breath of Fresh Air.
3. Design a bumper sticker that educates the general public about air pollution solutions.
4. Read the book, The Lorax. Choose one of the following activities to demonstrate your knowledge of the importance of trees and how their importance is shown in the book.
a) Read the book to a first or second grade class. Make a bulletin board for the class showing the meaning of this book.
b) Write a song about trees and this book. Use a popular tune such as Row, Row, Row Your Boat. Teach your song to some younger children.
c) Make up a skit based on the book with some of your classmates. Present the skit to another class.
5. All trees are different! You can show this in your classroom with the following activity. You only need a brown lunch bag and scissors.
a) To make these unique trees, have the students open the bag so it stands up. They should cut strips down from the top in varying lengths and widths.
b) Next they twist these strips to make branches.
c) Finally, the remainder of the bag is twisted to make a tree trunk. If you wish, students could paint their trees and add leaves or birds.
d) Set up the trees to make a forest. Look at all the unique ways these trees were made. This leads into a great discussion about individual differences!
e) This also makes a good center activity. Students could write a haiku about their trees after they finish constructing them!
