Quick Lessons
Attention Teachers, Click here to take a look at these activities for your classroom!

USA Weekend in Education
To get all 38 Teaching Tips offered by USA Weekend, click on the logo to the left, and then choose "Classroom" in the menu on the right. Once on that page, choose "Weekly Classroom Guides" (also a great resource!) and "Tips for Teachers" in the menu on the left.

Bizworld
A great tool for Teachers! Log on to www.bizworld.org - BizWorld is a program that provides hands-on activities for use in grades 3-8. It makes required curriculum come to life through fun, hands-on learning within real world situations. BizWorld meets curriculum standards across many required disciplines as part of math, social studies, economics or language arts curriculum.

*Thanks to the generous support of sponsors and donors, teachers in traditional schools with a minimum class size of 15 students can get one BizWorld kit FREE (excluding shipping and handling charges). See website for details.

Look at temperatures for other parts of the country. What is the difference in temperature from your own state? What two states will have weather temperatures similar to yours? Pick two states that will have very different temperatures from your own.

Operation Target Date
Summary
This project involves collecting a number of newspapers from around the state, region or world that are published on the same "target" date. To collect these newspapers, students write request letters to newspapers participating in the Target Date program. These newspapers can be used in many ways and across many subjects. The most basic activity is for students to compare the target date newspapers with their own local paper. Students can compile profiles of the communities where the papers are from and pinpoint the locations on a map - even tabulate the postage to determine the cost of the project.

For more activities and a list of participating newspapers click here.

News Catcher
Right click here and select "Save Target As" to download a News Catcher!
Summary
The NIE News Catcher mimics an old-time paper toy that you may remember from your elementary school days. This NIE version has been modified to serve as a fun way to introduce students to the myriad of features that make up a newspaper.

Instructions:
* Cut or neatly tear along the outer edge of the image, discarding the extra non-printed areas.
* Fold along the horizontal lines. Unfold. Fold along the horizontal lines. Unfold.
* Fold along diagonal lines. Flatten the sheet.
* Fold each outside corner under on the diagonal line, with right sides facing out. With smaller square, fold outside corners towards the inside center.
* Pull new outside corners up toward center, allowing lower flaps to open as finger holes.

The four outside squares name the functions of a newspaper. The eight 3-part triangle ach describe a newspaper feature and include instructions to find an example of the feature in the newspaper.

Any questions about this or other activities, call Mary Ellen McSheffrey at 617-619-6556.

Newspaper Walk Through History
Appropriate for all grade levels: Customize to meet skill levels. Uses a "flash card" concept to teach multiple skills.

Some Content areas Addressed: Language Arts, Character Education, History, Science, Global Studies, Social Studies

Material: Copies of full sized front pages from the newspaper including older newspapers. Each front page, headline or article should be mounted on poster board.

Process:
1. Hang the poster boards up around your classroom, be sure the dates on the newspaper are hidden from view.
2. Invite your students to walk among the pages, and look at each page. When they are finished ask them to arrange the pages in chronological order. This could be done as a team effort, or individually (Number or letter each board & ask students to put in order as a list.)
3. Let each student/group read their answers. A lively debate will ensue!

» Great for all ages K-12
» Be sure to have a prize for the winners, this always make things more exciting.
» You can use this concept over and over, just customizing each time, depending on the age of your students.
» It makes a great "leave behind" for future classes.