No matter your own feelings about Valentine’s Day, if you are an educator you know that it is a HUGE day for students of any age. It’s tricky to navigate through this holiday that is ostensibly predicated on love and kindness without someone feeling left out. So I’ve collected a few resources with great suggestions for preparing the best that you can to make this a happy day for your students.
“Celebrate Love and Kindness!” by Lindie Johnson recommends several different activities you can do to help students share their own traditions
“Celebrating Valentine’s Day” from Responsive Classroom suggests emphasizing charity and appreciation to steer away from commercialism and popularity contests
I went back through my Valentine’s Day posts and gathered links that are still live to put in this Wakelet collection. It includes some great lessons from Not Just Child’s Play, Byrdseed, and Minds in Bloom as well as many new ones, including Jamboard Valentine’s Day cards. I’m going to revise my Valentine’s Day “Would You Rather?” slides and post those soon!
A few years ago, I thought I would help out the parents of my gifted and talented students by writing about some games, toys, or books that I thought might make good purchases during the holiday season. I called the series of posts, “Gifts for the Gifted,” and I have continued to do it annually on every Friday in November and December. These gifts are suggestions for any child – not just those who qualify for a GT program. Sometimes I receive a free product for review, but I am not paid for these posts, and I never recommend a product that I wouldn’t buy for my own child. For past “Gifts for the Gifted” posts, you can visit this page.
For this post I am going to recommend two books. One is fiction and the other is not. Both have amazing illustrations. Both champion scientific discovery. And both feature strong females who are curious, persistent, and determined to pursue their interests despite costs and sacrifices.
I saw a comment about one of these books where the writer said, “If I had a daughter, I would give her this book.” That’s fine – but there’s no reason a son shouldn’t receive either of these as a gift. Yes, we need to increase the number of women in scientific fields. But that doesn’t mean that we need to exclude males from them. And, if our belief is that stereotypes should be eradicated, won’t this be helped even more by young men learning about inspiring females and males?
Ada Twist, Scientistis a delightful book by Andrea Beaty and David Roberts about a young girl who exasperates and amazes the adults in her life with her quests to find the right answer. This picture book is one that I reviewed a few months ago here, and part of a series of brilliant stories about children who refuse to allow life to just happen to them.
Women in Science, written and illustrated by Rachel Ignotofsky, has caught my eye on so many “Best Of…” lists that I finally had to order it. It says quite a bit about my education (and my memory) that I only recognize the names of 4 of the 50 female scientists described in this book. To be read independently, this book would be best for ages 8 and up. As a read-aloud, however, I don’t see any reason that parents or teachers couldn’t start earlier – maybe choosing one scientist a day to study. The graphics, colors, and font of this book separate it from the stodgy biographies that would immediately elicit yawns, and Ignotofsky has done a wonderful job of succinctly describing each scientists contributions in laymen’s terms.
With the upcoming Hidden Figures film and books like these, women in STEM careers are finally receiving real recognition. None of this negates the amazing feats of men in these fields. Instead, we are getting a richer picture of our history and more motivation to play significant roles in the future.
Just in case you didn’t properly ration your Teachers’ December Survival Kit, and you are finding yourself desperate for ways to make it through this final week before the break, here are some more activities that I’ve found from some of my favorite bloggers:
My 2nd graders have been doing some hard convergent thinking during our last couple of classes, so I thought it was time to practice creative thinking for a little while. They love doing S.C.A.M.P.E.R. activities, and I like to let them choose from a couple to keep things interesting. (You can visit this old post for an explanation of S.C.A.M.P.E.R. and some suggested activities.)
Yesterday they could choose between finding a substitution for snow to build a snowman or putting reindeer to another use for the 364 days of the year they aren’t in action. You can see some of their ideas below. I love that one student actually included a key on hers to explain the different parts!
Okay – other than the fact that tomorrow is Saturday, or that many of us in the education world are about to have a two-week break.
Friday + December + Engage Their Minds = Another Installment of the “Gifts for the Gifted” series.
Since it’s a bit close to the Big Day for some of us, I thought I would spotlight some cool ideas for gifts that would not require mail order. One of my favorites is the “DIY Explorer Activity Kit” detailed by the women at the Merry Thought blog. Inspired by the Child’s Activity Kits carried by Anthropologie, this post describes how you can make your own for your adventuresome child. The photographs are helpful for those of us who may not be quite as creative. Of course, you could do any number of variations of this kit, depending on your child’s personal interests.
I found some more ideas for DIY kits on the Kids’ Activities Blog. There are 101 suggestions, but here are some that I think are particularly suited for gifted kids in elementary school:
For more installments of “Gifts for the Gifted”, check out my Pinterest Board! Next Monday – a bonus post of recommended apps to load up on new tablets!
