Fostering Learning During School Shut Downs

School closures. Teaching remotely. Being unsure of when students will return to school after the Coronavirus closures. These are unprecedented times. My heart goes out to you all during these difficult times. I wanted to do some little thing to help out so I created a set of free calendars and newsletters to help you stay in contact with your students and families during this unprecedented Coronavirus crisis. I hope these free calendars and newsletters ease some of the stress on you. I have also compiled a list of online resources for parents and teachers which you can find below.

For Teachers – School to Home Communicator

Using the School-to-Home Communicator ~ Ideas for Use:

Use the PowerPoint tile to customize and type your information. Save the pages you need as a PDF. You have permission to email or distribute to your students and families through your district network Please do not share this file. Please ask teachers to download their own copy of this free file.

Use the fonts you like. Shrink or enlarge the font to fit the boxes. Add your own clip art if you wish.

Calendar page ideas:

• Keep students and parents informed during the challenges of school closures
• Use extra boxes to write a quote or inspirational message
• Type your contact email and school phone number

Second page ideas:

• The second page is totally flexible. Make your own category headings.
• Use the second page as a weekly newsletter or second page to your monthly newsletter
• List spelling words, learning goals, events, due dates, celebrate student milestones (birthdays, awards, kudos, etc.) and whatever else you need
• List website addresses your students and families need and use for student projects
• Share subject area content

I hope this helps ease the difficulty of teaching remotely.

For Parents & Kids – Free Online Educational Resources To Fill Time At Home

Please note – these links are here for reference and updated on 3-19-20, please use your discretion before allowing students/kids to access. If you’ve found a great resource that isn’t included and you think it should be, feel free to drop a comment below with the link and I’ll get it added!

Science

• Cincinnati Zoo – Home Safari – activities, information, videos
• Dairy Farm Virtual Tours – 3 different videos for ages 4 – 18+
• National Park Virtual Tours – 5 National Parks
• New England Aquarium – Virtual Tours, presentations, and at home activities
• NASA Climate Time Machine
• Simulations in Math and Science – Univ. of Colorado Boulder

Math

• Hooda Math Multiplication Games – TONS of online games
• Functions Machine Interactive- Guess the Rule
• Arithmetic Attack – Timed basic facts practice for all 4 math operations
• Reducing Fractions Game
• Coordinate Graphing Game “What’s the Point”
• The U.S. Mint – Games to learn all about U.S. Currency
• Rocking your 7’s Song – YouTube (they have all the times tables songs)
• Brain Teasers – 4^th Grade
• Brain Teasers – 5^th Grade

Arts

• Metropolitan Opera – Free Nightly Shows
• Broadway Plays – links to multiple sources for Broadway plays
• Lunch Doodles with Mo – Daily Videos of drawing/doodling/writing

Language Arts

• Scholastic Learn At Home – daily activities, scroll to bottom to choose your grade level (preK – 9th grade)
• Story Time From Space – Youtube Video Collection
• Storyline Online – Listen to books
• Spanish Story Time – Stories read in Spanish with written English Translations
• English Zone – activities, worksheets, games etc. organized by topic
• Read, Write, Think – Lessons, Interactives & Ideas Grades 3-4 (you can change the grade level)
• Reader’s Theater Scripts – by Aaron Shep
• IXL ELA Resources Grade 3
• IXL ELA Resources Grade 4
• Poems for Kids
• Daily Grammar – has lessons and quizzes by topic

History & Social Studies

• George Washington’s Mount Vernon Estate – Virtual Tour
• Gilder Lehrman – Learn All About Abraham Lincoln, 16^th President of the USA
• Library of Congress Classroom Materials
• Interactive Lewis and Clark Trail
• Colonial Williamsburg – Explore from Home Resources
• Geography Games for ages 7-11 – from the U.K.

All Subjects

• Hoagies Talented & Gifted Web Links (all students are talented & gifted!)
• Khan Academy – requires you to subscribe via email but free
• Khan Academy Kids – for ages 2 – 7
• PBS Kids – Games
• Smithsonian Learning Lab – Discover, Create, Share and Learn
• PBS Learning News Videos Quizzes for Upper Elementary Students with Support Materials
• National Geographic – choose the resource type, grade level, and subject
• Census Bureau Activities for Grades 3-4
• BBC Dance Mat Typing – improve your keyboarding skills

Physical Activity

• Beachbody Kids Workouts – geared towards fun movement/dance

Museums

• British Museum – London – Virtual Tour
• National Gallery of Art – Washington DC – 2 Virtual Exhibits 
• Musee d’Orsay – Paris, France – 1 Virtual Exhibit
• National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art – South Korea – 4 Virtual Exhibits 
• Van Gogh Museum – 2 Virtual Exhibits 
• MASP – Sao Paulo Brazil – 6 Virtual Exhibits 

I hope this post helps teachers, parents, and children feel a little more at ease during these strange and unprecedented times. Remember to take time to love one another, spread kindness, get a breath of fresh air outside, and wash your hands. 🙂