Summer School Week 1

This summer, I am leading a 5 week summer school program for a group of vivacious kids.  The first day was full of energy and I can tell its going to be an awesome time.  The goal is to have a math, reading, and writing component each session - with loads of fun.


I'm going to share what we do each week and how well I felt it worked.

Reading - we are going to participate in the local libraries summer reading program.  We will make a field trip to the library every other week so the kids can submit their game boards and receive a prize.  This is great because the kids don't usually go to the library.


Writing - Modified Content Clues - We had the kids choose a picture (I preselected images from various magazines) and then they had to write as many sentences as their grade level times two.  So third graders had to write 6 sentences about their image, fourth graders 8, etc.

Math - Race to $1.00 - A little friendly competition between the boys and girls, with the final challenge being they had to calculate how many quarters they needed to make $10.00. 


Teambuilding - Eyes, Body, Voice , description from Sleep Deprived Dragon:
 
"This game is best played in a gym or some open area. Split your girls into groups of three. Two of the girls are blindfolded, the third is permitted to see. One of the blindfolded girls is the "body"; she can move but is not permitted to see or speak. The other blindfolded girl is the "voice", she can speak but can neither see nor move. The third girl is the "eyes", she can see but can't speak or move.
 
For each team of girls, place a ball somewhere within the playing area. Also place one traffic cone (pylon) somewhere in the playing area. Each team's goal is to guide their "body" to their team's ball, pick it up, and then tag it to the pylon. The "voice" and the "eyes" for each team will have to give the "body" directions to find the ball. This is much more difficult than it sounds as the "eyes" and "voice" need to be able to effectively communicate with each other in order to give directions to the "body". A great communications game!"

Most of my ideas come from Education.com - a tremendous resource in creative activities, worksheets, articles, and more revolving around noneother than education (of course).