SUMMER!! Summertime Fun + Crafts

SUMMERTIME: And the Livin' is Easy

By Debbie Clement, Editor-in-Chief

JULY!! JULY!! A whole new month. Welcome to "PreK+K Sharing!" 

July on this side of the planet says, "Let's go to the beach." For many teachers, July is also a time of reflection and rejuvenation. It's a time to begin gathering the momentum for a new year. For others in the childcare world -- time marches on with day-to-day care. For parents? Perhaps its a little bit of both. 

I've gathered up some summertime, beachie fun to get this month's inspiration started. ENJOY! Let's go to the beach! Grab your sunscreen! When I think July. I think FULL on color! My long-time friends know how much I adore COLOR! So grab your shades, too.

Florida BLUE sky beach pleasure

That's my own son-in-law with our youngest WonderPeep taking wing during family fun!

I asked random beachie-mommy for permission for this picture-taking moment. Promise. 

Now how do we bottle up all of that sun and sand and take it back into the classroom (or family room) to keep our treasured field trips, our memories and our planned excursions in full views? Let's start with several 'paper plate' based SIMPLE projects. This first one with painted tootsies is sure to brighten your day! 

You're gonna just LUV LUV LUV this next simple paper plate art process fishie! Cut a simple triangle and you simultaneously create both tail fin and open mouth! 

Next up? An entire bulletin board of SUPER crepe-paper sunshines supervising the school of swimming fish below. Both the sunshines and the fishies are 'built' on paper plate bases. The fish are simple finger paint explorations captured in time. (With teacher-added fin embellishments.) Thanks to my friends at the Columbus JCC for sharing their finished display with me during my recent tour. 

Here's another bulletin board. This one in a Milwaukee school I performed for earlier in the year. Look at these jellyfish amid their fishie counterparts. 

Some more early childhood summer sun! 

I told you that you'd need sunscreen!!

These decorated both walls and hung suspended from the ceiling. 

If we're going to the beach then we need to bring our buckets. Has your school adopted the 'filling buckets' metaphor? It is such a concrete idea for young children. 

I have seen oodles and oodles of 'bucket-filling' systems in my travels over the past couple of years. This kindergarten artwork is part of a RoundUP of buckets being used in the classroom, to collect kindness acts that I have catalogued on my own blog. It is truly worth your effort to click over there to see what I mean.

Here is a more recent review of 'buckets' and Character Development ideas. 

 

Now. Back to our beachie-reflections. What better time when we're talking about beaches and oceans and water, to check in with our young herd and see just what they know about the basics. In this case? Colors! BLUE! I just LUV this teacher created 'anchor chart' that was on display in a Head Start classroom in upstate New York. 

Just last week I created a MONUMENTAL RoundUP of my favorite anchor charts. 
Probably da coolest part of the article is seeing how teachers have 'organized' their charts. 
Think HANGERS! Think hang-it-up! 

Now for some more bulletin boards and school murals of fish! These first glittering fish were part of a Valentine's celebration. How cute are these? 

"A School Filled with LOVE!" Valentine's Day Bulletin Board 

No trip to the beach would be complete without a reading of Chicka-Chicka palm trees. I LUV, LUV, LUV these kindergarten drawings in response to their reading. Aren't the hand-stamped letters a brilliant addition to the magic marker and crayon palm tree drawings?

We're ready to conclude our beachie field trip with last week's sundown up here along the 'coast' of our Eagle Harbor view of Green Bay.

And here's an oh-so-simple way to create a sunset painting -- even with the very young! 
Fold the paper to create two different palettes. 

We're not quite done! 
July also makes me think of gardens-in-bloom. 
FULL COLOR BLOOM! 

Tissue Paper Applied to Contact Paper Flower ~~ Displayed on the Window

All of this color inspiration + the idea of some discretionary time? 

Perhaps you, the teacher can use some inspiration for a DIY project for your classroom. 

Here's two to choose from. 

Buttons on the letter form. Hand-painted author's chair. 

You decide! 

Now. Let's wrap things up! 
If it's July. 
Then the FOURTH-of-JULY can't be too far behind! 



Last summer my July article here was sharing all about my picture book and the song that it is based on, entitled 
"Red, White and Blue" 

By all means, if you are looking for patriotic arts + crafts projects for children, please return to that article for inspiration all over again! 
A lot can happen in a year!

Since this time last year, I have begun the process of transferring my songs from their CD format, to digital download zipped files. 



I have created a digital file of this song for your immediate purchase. 
The zipped file includes 2 Mp3 versions of the music: 
a 'sung-song' and an instrumental. 
There are also pdfs of the music notation and the sign language chart to support your performance using sign language. 

The zipped file is housed in our 
EARLY EDUCATION EMPORIUM 
where many of our collaborative authors here and our best friends, 
offer you our products for direct download and traditional shipping of hardgood products. 

Two weeks from today, I will be delivering the OPENING KEYNOTE for the SDE "I Teach Kindergarten" conference in Vegas. The countdown is really heating up at this point. I am working hard on my message and  unique, hand-painted ensemble for my big 15 minutes of fame.

From Hand painting my skirt,  to attaching ruffles, making the Vest front and then progress on the back!

By all means if you are going to attend, please, please, please come up and introduce yourself! We will be having a special drawing for our readers in attendance at VEGAS! If you're not able to attend in person, please send me your best thoughts for July 15th!

By all means please 'pin generously' from this article. We appreciate your circulating our material to the wider world. 

-- Debbie -- 

***Last month I hit 125,000 'organic' Pinterest followers. I wrote a mini-encyclopedia of how to use Pinterest from a 'marketing' perspective. If you're a blogger (or small business owner) and haven't read it, I promise it will be worth your time. The feedback has been amazing. 

I'm now at 126,411 followers!     

Click this link to go there directly! 

Now at 434 followers!

Please connect at my blog, my FB fanpage, on LinkedIN, or Twitter and now on Instagram, too!