Friday Freebies!

I have to admit, I love discovering exciting free resources for use in the classroom. My current favourite are from the European Comission. They have been producing a little booklet called 'Passport to the European Union' for a number of years now. For a while it was only available as a pdf but there are now some hardcopies available again!

My class absolutely love these! They are in full colour and feature two pages of information on each country in the EU. There are also flag, famous landmark and currency stickers on each page. They fit in so well with a Europe topic but can also be used a little extra, particularly in Key Stage Two! At the beginning of this year, we spent five minutes, focused on one country per day and had frequent 'capital city' quizzes.....I have a few experts by this stage in the year!

There are also some lovely free child-friendly maps, which look great on the classroom wall!

Click here for Europe Map for Children

Click here for Passport to th EU

Have fun exploring Europe!

Mr Potato Head

There are so many versions of the 'Mr Potato Head' behaviour incentive online but this is how it works for me! Firstly, you need a Mr Potato Head model with a variety of body parts and accessories. This can be quite expensive in toy stores but I managed to pick up a selection really cheaply on eBay!

I begin by showing the children the completed model, before taking it all apart and putting the pieces in a box or basic. Each day the children have the opportunity to, as a whole class, earn one piece of the model.

Each time the class have lined up quietly, tidied up well or are listening attentively, they get a point on a tally on the whiteboard. On the other hand, if they are slow to respond to instructions, very untidy or noisy, I get a point. If they manage to get more points than me by the end of the day then they earn a piece of Mr Potato Head. When the model is completed (this may take days or weeks), the class receive an agreed incentive. It's important that they know what they are working towards. I've found that a night off homework, a period of golden time, extra outdoor play or a 'no pencil day', with lots of art, drama, music and PE work really well as incentives.

I find that it works best if the children don't lose pieces of the model - if there is a lot of misbehaviour they simply don't earn another piece.

As always, this will work better for some classes than it will for others! Have fun trying it out and let me know how it goes :)

Adverb, Adjective, Action!

Adverb, adjective, action is a fun, fast-paced game to help pupils identify nouns, verbs, adjectives, pronouns, prepositions, conjunctions etc. It is designed for KS2 but could be adapted for KS1.

Best of all....there are no resources needed - just a class of enthusiastic children! Click on the photo below for full instructions!

Hello!

Hello and welcome to the first post in this 'Add a bit of sparkle' blog for primary school teachers and everyone else who works with children! 

I am a primary school teacher and I occasionally love browsing the Internet for new ideas although when I do so, I often end up feeling frustrated and disheartened! Why? Simply because the amazing ideas that I find often require far more money or time than I have available to me! 

The aim of this blog is to share some realistic ideas that can be used with primary-aged children and don't require a huge budget or massive amount of time! They won't change the world, but hopefully they will help you to 'add a bit of sparkle' to your classroom and your lessons and who knows what that sparkle may ignite in the minds of your learners? A little bit of sparkle can go a long way!

photo credit: <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/23307937@N04/3951453583">they fell out the box like this</a> via <a href="http://photopin.com">photopin</a> <a href="https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/">(license)</a>