St. Patrick’s Day Mini Theme for Kids (Part 2)

 If you have not had a chance to view (Part 1) of the St. Patrick’s Day Mini Theme, you can visit it here.

Literacy – Shamrock -AT Words – -AT Shamrocks 

Materials needed:  Clothespins, a basket to hold the clothespins, one -AT Shamrock file (linked above) for each child, and a permanent marker.

Print the file (linked above) onto heavy paper for each of your students (laminate the shamrocks for durability, if desired.)  Read each of the words to your children.  Remind the children that the words belong to the same word family (the -at family) and that they are rhyming words.  Once the children adapt to changing the BEGINNING letter sound, word families are FUN!

We sing “made up” silly songs to get the children into the habit of changing the beginning letter to form new rhyming words (ex: to the tune of “Farmer in the Dell” – “The Rat Sat on the Mat, The Rat Sat on the Mat, Hi, Ho, the Dairy O, The Rat Sat on the Mat!”)

Have the children look through the basket to find the matching clothespins for the letters on their shamrocks.  Once the clothespins are clipped to the shamrock cards, the children can practice writing each of the letters (or only the BEGINNING letter) onto a separate sheet of paper or index cards. *There are BLANK shamrocks at the end of the file for use with any other word families or sight words your children may be working on.

Extension:  The  Shamrock  Game

Print several copies of the -AT words cards and cut apart.  Keep the word cards in a pile for the children to choose from.

Have the children form a circle.  The game is played similar to “Drop the Hanky.”  Choose one child to be IT and have that child pick one -AT shamrock card from the pile.  The “it” child walks around the outside of the circle carrying one shamrock -AT word card (picked from the pile).  When ready (we make a limit of TWO times around the circle), the “it” child must drop the shamrock behind the back of another child.  Both children then run around the circle to claim the empty spot.  If the first child to claim the empty spot reads the the dropped -AT word card correctly (younger children can try to name only the BEGINNING letter/sound), he/she gets to keep the card.  If not, the card is returned to the bottom of the word card pile.  The child still standing, must then choose another child to be “IT” and take that spot in the circle.  

Play continues until each child has had a turn to be tapped or be IT.  At the end of the game, count the number of shamrocks held by all the children in the circle.  The next time the game is played, see if the group can BEAT the total number of cards they “earned” from the time before.

Fingerprint Rainbow and Pot of Gold Art Craft

Materials needed:  Tempera paints (red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, and violet), white cardstock, black construction paper, glue sticks, scissors, and small gold (pretend) coins.

Let the children use the tempera paints to fingerprint each of the colors into a rainbow. Allow the fingerprints dry thoroughly before adding the pot and coins.  Have the children tear or cut the black paper into a shape to resemble the pot.  Glue the black pot near the bottom of the rainbow.  The children can use glue, tape, or poster putty to put the coins on top of the black pot.

Visit our blog again this week as we will continue to post activities for the St. Patrick’s Day Mini Theme for Kids!