Hello July! I can’t believe we’ve made it through another whole year of sharing monthly calendars of jokes with you! Today, I have our last set, the July Joke of the Day 2nd Edition!

July Joke of the Day 2nd Edition

Have you been following along each day as I share a different joke of the day on Facebook?

Since this is the second edition, there are all new jokes this month! You’ll find some silly summer jokes and some fun ocean animal jokes this month. Each month, I also turn them into a printable so you can easily print them out and have the page handy all month to share with your class or family at home.

These jokes are a simple, fun way to connect with your students and make them laugh. This month, we have fun jokes that are sure to make your little ones giggle and maybe get some eye rolls.

Sharing humor can foster a positive, lighthearted environment, whether at home, in the classroom, or among friends. It sets a cheerful tone for the day.

Share the jokes with your class during your morning meeting, getting ready to go to lunch, or when you are packing up for the day before you go home. During the summer months, share them with your family at home during lunch or dinner to get some giggles. 

I made the joke of the day printable available to print in both color and black and white.

You can download the July Joke of the Day 2nd Edition printable by clicking the green box below.

If you missed the first edition of the July Joke of the Day printable, you can find it here.

If your kids are loving the jokes, you might also want to check out our Summer Jokes Bingo set. 
The bingo cards are filled with the answers to 30 different jokes. You will read each joke, and then the students will find the correct answer on their board. There is a matching picture on each of the calling cards and bingo cards, so the students can easily check their answers. The pictures on the boards also make it so non-readers and ESL students can play as well. You can grab the Summer Jokes Bingo set here.

I hope your kiddos will enjoy this new set of jokes just as much as the first!

See you next time!

Jenette

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this article (and most) on primary playground, does contain affiliate links that we do earn a commission off of.  clicking these links does not cost you any extra but helps our website to keep great articles and freebies like this coming your way.

July means Shark Week is coming so I wanted to share a fun Literacy Snack Shark Read Aloud today.

This week, we are reading, I’m Getting A Shark! by Brady Smith. A girl overhears her mom and dad talking about her getting a shark for her birthday. Throughout the book, she wonders what type of shark it will be. Her pet dog helps give facts about the different sharks throughout the story. In the end, she ends up getting an adoption certificate to save a shark for her birthday.

For our snack this week, we’ll be making our very own shark!

THIS ACTIVITY WORKS WELL WITH

Snack Idea

Ingredients you’ll need for each student

• 1/4 cup graham cracker crumbs
• 1/3 cup instant vanilla pudding or a vanilla pudding cup
• Blue food coloring
• A quarter of an Oreo cookie (you’ll want to have these cut into quarter and ready to go)
• A spoon
• Small plastic cup (9 oz is a good size)

If you’ll be using the instant pudding, the 3.4 oz box makes 5 servings. Add a drop or two of blue food coloring ahead of time to make the snack assembly quick and easy. If you are using a vanilla pudding cup, I suggest you hellp add the drop of blue food coloring in the cup and let them mix it up. They can then add it to their snack.

To Assemble

To make the shark snack, the students will first add the graham cracker crumbs to the bottom of the cup as the sand layer. Next, they’ll add the vanilla pudding as the water. Last, the students wil add their Oreo in the water as the shark fin. Isn’t it cute?!

Free Printable

While your students are enjoying their shark pudding snack, I made a printable for them to work on. They will draw and write about something new they learned about sharks from the book.

You can download the Literacy Snack Shark Read Aloud free printable from my TeachersPayTeachers store by clicking the green box below.

If you’re looking for some more fun shark books, I gathered all of my favorite shark read-alouds here. The shark snack we made today would go perfectly with any of these books as well!

I hope you little learners enjoy this fun shark read-aloud and making these shark snacks!

See you next time!

Jenette

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Can you believe we’re already headed into July? Time is sure flying by! Today I have the July Joke Of The Day Printable for you! I have officially shared 12 months of printable jokes for you now!

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If you are new here, each day I share a joke of the day on my Facebook page. Each month I gather all of the jokes I share and make it into a printable for you so you can easily have all of the jokes together to share with your students or families.

This month is full of silly jokes about summer, ocean animals and a bunch of shark jokes, perfect for shark week this month. They are sure to make your kids giggle and maybe even get some eye rolls.

These jokes are fun to share especially if you are teaching summer school or are doing a summer camp for kids. If you’re at home and sharing them with your family, why not bring them out at dinner time, or even bring the jokes on your summer trip?!

I’ve made the free printable available to print in both color and black and white for you.

You can download the July Joke Of The Day Printable for free by clicking the green box below.

I hope your kids enjoy these silly jokes this month! Share with us below which ones are their favorites!

If you’re planning ahead, you can grab the August Joke Of The Day free printable here.

See you next time!

Jenette

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this article (and most) on primary playground, does contain affiliate links that we do earn a commission off of.  clicking these links does not cost you any extra but helps our website to keep great articles and freebies like this coming your way.

This week, we celebrate the 4th of July which is such an important day for Americans. I wanted a read-aloud to share for our special day and I think this one is great! For today’s literacy snack, we’ll be reading Apple Pie 4th Of July by Janet S. Wong.

In this book, a young girl is embarrassed by her parents cooking Chinese food at their convenience store on Independence Day, She is then surprised when they get numerous customers coming in to get Chinese food. It’s a great message about what it is to be American and embracing your family’s heritage and customs.

For today’s snack idea to go along with the book, we’re having apple pie!

THIS ACTIVITY WORKS WELL WITH

snack idea

To go along with the book we’re having apple pie today! Depending on if you’re doing this in the classroom or at home since it’s summertime you have a few options. Pick up a yummy full apple pie and give everyone a small slice, or pick up the individual-sized pies they have at Walmart. We used the mini pies when we read Enemy Pie and you can see them here.

free printable

While the kids are enjoying their yummy apple pie, I made a free printable for them to work on. They will get to draw and write about how they celebrate the 4th of July.

You can download the free printable from my Teachers Pay Teachers store below. 

Wishing you a safe and happy 4th of July!

See you next time!

Jenette

The post Literacy Snack Idea 4th Of July appeared first on Primary Playground.

This article (and most) on primary playground, does contain affiliate links that we do earn a commission off of.  clicking these links does not cost you any extra but helps our website to keep great articles and freebies like this coming your way.

Are you ready for summer? How about a vacation? We’re going to have our beach fun today as we read, There Was An Old Lady Who Swallowed A Shell! by Lucille Colandro.

In this fun rhyming book of the classic song, the old lady swallows a bunch of beach items and ultimately builds a sandcastle in the end! So to go with our story today, we’ll be building our very own sandcastle snack!

These resources work well with the blog post.

Snack idea

Each student will need:

2 graham crackers

1 pretzel stick

1 small rectangle of cheese.- I took an 8oz bar of cheese and sliced it into pieces.

This snack is very open-ended and allows your student to create their own sandcastle. They can break their graham crackers into as many or as few pieces as they’d like and build a castle of their own. I love seeing how everyone’s creations turn out differently!

free printable

I made a free printable to go along with the book for your little learners to work on too. They will get to color each of the items that the old lady swallowed in the book. This is a great sequencing and retelling activity. You can have them color in the items as you read the story or see if they can retell you the order of the book as they color while enjoying their snack.

You can download the free printable from my TeachersPayTeachers store by clicking the green box below.

If you’re looking for some other books to read for summer, you might also like our literacy snack idea to go along with Blueberries For Sal. You can check that out here.

What are some of your other favorite picture books to celebrate summer?

See you next time!

Jenette

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The other day I shared my Pete the Cat painted rocks for the classroom. Today, I’m sharing with you a free printable cool cat award that can be given along with placing the rock on their desk, or when you take the rock back at the end of the day.

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It’s an opportunity to write a little note to the student. They can take it home and show it off proudly that they got to have Pete the Cat sit on their desk with them that day.

Maybe you want to thank them for having a nice and clean desk. Or for how well they’re doing with practicing their sight words. Everyone likes a little recognition from time to time.

You can download the free printable cool cat award by clicking the green box below. 

Thanks for stopping by!

Jenette

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I remember way back when I was in second grade and my teacher used quiet critters in our classroom. I remember sitting there trying so hard to be quiet, just waiting for her to pass by and hoping she would gently place a quiet critter on my desk.

It can be the smallest thing in your classroom that makes a big impact on our students everyday. I decided I wanted to do something similar to these quiet critters but with a different spin on it. With painting rocks such a huge craze right now, I decided to use painted rocks as a classroom incentive.

You only need a few supplies to make these cute rocks.

Supplies needed

Paint Pens -these are the ones I use

Acrylic paints

paint brush

Rocks – you can find some out on a walk or you can buy a bag of rocks from Home Depot.

Clear coat spray paint

To make the rocks start by washing them and letting them dry thoroughly to make sure all the dirt is gone and the paint will stay on nicely. Next is the fun part, painting! I am by no means a good at drawing or painting, but with a little help from our friends at Art for Kids Hub, I was able to create these cute Pete the Cat designs.

The possibilities are endless with what you can add to your rocks. Maybe you have a monster theme and you want to paint some monsters, or even encouraging words like keep up the great work.

After the paint has dried, make sure to use to a clear coat on the rocks so they’ll be sealed and hold up to the wear and tear of the classroom.

It doesn’t matter how great or bad you think they look because in the kids mind, they see Pete the Cat and they couldn’t be any more happy about that!

Using the painted rocks as a classroom incentive is a fun twist to add and something the kids will be so excited about.

What will you paint on your rocks?

Jenette

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We had so much fun playing math games with our UNO cards, we decided to come up with 5 math games to play with DOS cards!

Have you played the new game DOS? It’s nothing like UNO  but it’s a great new game that our family loves to play together. I thought it would be fun to make up even more math games to go with these cards since they go to 10 instead of 9 like an UNO deck of cards.

Even and Odd

To Play

Separate out the number cards 1-10 from the deck. Keep out one card that is even and one card that is odd. Place the rest of the cards in a pile. Have the student choose a card and decide if the number is an even or an odd number and place it in the correct pile. Continue until all of the cards are gone.

Skip Counting

To Play

Separate out the number cards 1-10 from the deck. The students will look through the cards and find the number 2. Next they’ll look for the next number needed, a 4 and continue on to practice skip counting. Have them continue practicing until all the cards have been used.

Making Five

To Play

Separate out all of the cards 1-5 and then set all the of 5 of the 5 cards aside. These will be the number the student is trying to make. The students will practice their making 5 number fluency by showing the different ways there are to make 5. We used post it notes to add in an equal sign so it was easier for them to see the equations. There are no zero cards in the deck so you can either talk about that being another way to make five or you could add in a few zeros on post it notes as well.

Making Ten With Number Bonds

To Play

Separate out all of the 10 cards and put them in a pile. Set all of the other numbers in second pile. Have the student choose a ten cards and place it down. Now they will choose a card from the number pile and put it above to the left of the ten like a number bond. Have the student look through the number pile to find the other number they need to complete the number bond. Have them continue playing until all of the cards are gone. For visual purposes, you may want to have a couple of scratch pieces of thin cut paper to add as the lines to the ten to make it look more like a number bond they may be used to.

Making Ten With Ten Frame

To Play

This one was a favorite since we get to use manipulatives too! Set aside one 10 card and place it to the side of the ten frame to show the student this is the number they are making. Have them choose a card from the pile. Have them fill in the ten frame using the same color manipulatives to reflect the number they choose. Last, have them fill in the remaining spots with manipulatives to complete the ten frame and have them find that number in the card pile to complete their ten frame.

You can print a ten frame below

Can you think of any other fun games you could play with the DOS cards?

Jenette

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A couple of weeks ago I shared a fun sight word balloon toss game that we did to practice our sight words this summer. We had my nephew over the other day that is going into kindergarten this fall so we switched up the game and did this letters and sounds balloon toss.

THIS ACTIVITY WORKS WELL WITH

My kids learned their letter sounds when they were 2 with the help of the Letter Factory.  My nephew has been obsessed with it too and we love to sing the song together to practice our letter sounds.

We’re taking our letters and sounds practice outside today and using water balloons. I drew a bunch of letters on the ground with chalk and made a circle around each one to make it more like a target. You can have the kids write the letters too for practice.

Next, you’ll want to fill up the water balloons. Have the kids choose a letter, say the name and the sound that it makes, and then toss the water balloon at it.

Have them keep going until they’ve identified each letter and sound. Move to another area and play the game all over again! Water balloons make practicing letters and sounds so much fun!

I hope you kids have as much as mine did with this letters and sounds balloon toss!

What other ways do you like to practice letters and sounds outside?

Jenette

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I’ve got a fun summer project for you today! A DIY teacher stool for the classroom! My mom found this stool the other day in someone’s bulk pick-up pile and knew I would want it! Thanks mom!

Is anyone else obsessed with the cute Pete the Cat plush from Kohls? We grabbed one when we were doing a little back-to-school shopping the other day. When I got the stool, I just knew that I wanted to incorporate Pete.

This is what the stool looked like when I got it home. A little rough around the edges but nothing a little love could help with.

Supplies

wooden stool – the thrift store is a great place to find them

acrylic and/or chalk paint

paint brushes

clear coat spray paint

possibly need

sandpaper

wood filler

painters tape

First, I fixed up the seat of the stool with some wood filler, let it dry, and then sanded it to make it nice and smooth. My son helped me pick the colors. His favorite Pete book is Pete the Cat Rocking in My School Shoes, so we took inspiration from the cover. He suggested painting the bottom red to look like Pete’s shoes and I love how it turned out! I am in no way a great drawer/painter but our friends at Artforkidshub.com helped with a Pete the Cat tutorial.

I painted all of the stool and then used a pencil to draw in Pete. I then went back and painted him. Last I went back and outlined him with black. After the paint has dried, use a clear coat of spray paint to seal it to help it stand up to the wear and tear it’ll get in the classroom.

I just LOVE how it turned out! I hope it gives you some inspiration to make a DIY teacher stool of your own!

See you next time!

Jenette

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Do your students have desks or tables in your classroom? These duct tape desk drawers have been an absolute lifesaver to keep their desks organized. You only need a couple items to make these or to ask each student to make one and bring it in at the beginning of the school year. No need for pencil boxes this way!

Materials

A fun roll of duct tape of your choice

A small box flat – the best ones I’ve found to fit our desk are actually wine flats that I get from Trader Joe’s. If you call them and ask them to set them aside for you they are more than happy to.

Scissors

Instructions

It’s a simple project. You’ll just cut several strips of duct tape to completely cover the box. It ends up making the box much more sturdy and stands up to a whole school year in the desks. Sometimes we’re even able to get 2 years out of them.

The drawers keep everything nice and corralled in the top section of their desk. It makes my organized loving heart happy!

Hope this helps keep your students a bit more organized this year!

Jenette

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There’s just nothing like doing some summer reading! I look forward to having a bit more time during the summer to sit back and relax with a book. I’m sharing this fun free printable summer reading bingo that you can share with your kiddos before they go off to summer break to help encourage them to keep reading over the summer.

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It has fun things for the kids to do while reading such as reading to a stuffed animal, reading while eating ice cream, or even reading while wearing sunglasses! Anything to help encourage those kiddos to keep reading through the summer!

This would be perfect to hand out alongside a summer review packet, or even to go along with a book you may have purchased from Scholastic to give to the students as an end-of-the-year gift.

If you work at the library this would be a fun addition to a summer reading program too. Have the kids fill out the bingo sheet and bring it back in for a small prize.

I’ve included both a color and a black and white option depending on how many you’ll be printing.

You can download the summer reading bingo from my teacherspayteachers store below.

If you’re looking for some additional activities to send home with your kiddos, I have some more great free bingo idea boards.

A general, any time of the year reading bingo here.

A math bingo here

And a screen-free bingo here

I hope you get to enjoy some summer reading of your own!

See you next time!

Jenette

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