Quick & Easy Valentine Math
Quick & Easy Valentine Math
Looking for a quick activity for a Valentine’s Day party? I loved this fun and EASY idea for a Valentine toss game from Little Family Fun. Easy to prep and tons of fun. Since I am always searching for ways to create educational game, I created a math component to add to the game. Make a quick and easy Valentine math game with a free subtraction recording sheet! [Read more…]
Penguin Palooza!
It’s time for penguins, penguins, PENGUINS!!! Penguins are one of my favorite animals. Whenever I look at them, I can’t help smiling 🙂
A bunch of The Primary Pack has gotten together for a Penguin Palooza! Join our penguin hop for freebies, ideas, and a giveaway with All Things Penguin! All this penguin cuteness may send me over the edge.
I’ll start out with some penguin freebies!
My daughter is a little bit obsessed with “Go Fish”. She loves playing it over and over and over. This can get quite tedious, except that this means she is practicing her sight words (or high frequency words) over and over and over! Knowing that she is getting so much exposure and practice with her words, washes the tedium away!
She does a great job with her sight words, so I wanted to move into some CVC practice. I wanted her to really focus on sounding out the words, so I wrote the word on each card with a different fish. She gets no picture help on the card, so she really needs to focus her energy on sounding out the word. What does this have to do with penguins? Well penguins eat fish!
My daughter brought Penny Penguin into the game, too. Penny is a penguin that I made a few years ago out of a Cascade container. You can see more about her here.
This penguin has had so many uses. We feed her letters, words, and numbers. She loves counting and has eaten many goldfish. I created a fishing game with a magnetic fishing pole to use with Penny Penguin. You can get see the game and get a free copy here.
When playing “Go Fish”, Penny Penguin gets to eat all the matches. To be able to win “Go Fish”, each player has to read the word on each set of matches before Penny will eat them. This gives another opportunity for your kids to reread the words. Plus, they just love feeding the penguin.
Get your own free copy of “Short Vowel Go Fish” here.
I have one more freebie for you! This is an Arctic Animal Even & Odd Pack.
Kids can identify numerals 1-40 and sort them by even and odd numbers. It is another way to disguise rote practice in a game format. Kids love the adorable clip art and have fun putting the animals into the arctic environment. I just updated this freebie. If you already own it, go back and re-download.
There really is so much fun to have with penguins! Who can resist these adorable penguin shapes?? Imagine a whole class with penguin headbands. That will definitely get them practicing their shapes! You can find the penguin shapes pack here.
My kids love “Roll, Say, Keep”! I have a few penguin themed “Roll. Say, Keep” games to practice alphabet letters & sounds, and sight words. You can check them out here! We are playing with letter sounds below.
I hope you found some fun ideas to use with your little penguins!
Before you go, don’t forget there’s a Penguin Palooza sale! Head over to TeachersPayTeachers and type ‘penguinpalooza’ in the search engine, or click here. You will find bunches of penguin resources marked down just for Penguin Palooza!
You can find all of my penguin fun on sale from January 14-19.
It wouldn’t be Penguin Palooza without a giveaway! You can enter on the link below.
a Rafflecopter giveaway
Do the penguin waddle to head over to all the stops on this Penguin Hop. You will be fully stocked with penguin goodies for the cold winter days ahead of us!
DIY Turkey From A Plastic Bucket
Learning Fun With Turkey: Turkey Learning Activities
Tons of learning activities revolving around a turkey. Great ideas to incorporate around Thanksgiving. DIY turkey container (he really eats!), rhyming activities, letter identification, initial and ending sound fun, and more!
You can see the directions to make a turkey out of a Cascade container here.
Get the directions to make the Print & Cut turkey here.
Ways to Use Your Turkey
Pass out cards to help kids practice basic skills: letter identification, beginning & ending sounds, rhymes, numeral identification, counting, addition, subtraction, or any skill you choose. We used cards from my Turkey Time: Literacy Pack. You can pass out cards to the whole group, or use the turkey in a center. Kids will feed the turkey!


Use the “Turkey Time” rhyme to spark excitement with the kids. Change the key words in the rhyme to help students’ focus on the specific skills.
Get your free copy of the turkey rhyme here.
Materials Needed for Bucket Turkey
- Plastic bucket (I got mine from the Dollar Store)
- Foam or card stock
- Felt to cover the turkey’s body
- Hot glue
- Magnet
- Tape
DIY Bucket Turkey

Step 3: Tape the feathers together and glue the black pupils into the middle of the eyes.
Step 4: Tape a magnet or rock to the tip of the beak. This is just to give the beak some weight. It will help keep the turkey’s mouth closed.
Step 9: Your turkey is ready for learning fun!