Overview

Encourage the interactive learning that K-2 students thrive on! Primary & Perfect offers nine months of new seasonal and thematic Bag Ladies projects especially designed for little hands and your K-2 curriculum. An extra set of summer activities makes this book a perfect choice for after school and summer school, too! More than 40 hands-on projects and activities, complete step-by-step instructions with blackline masters, and photographs of the finished projects make it easy and fun to teach to the standards. If you're a primary teacher, this book is truly perfect for you.

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9780929895628

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Reviews

The Bag Ladies' Primary & Perfect: Seasonal & Thematic Projects for K-2 Learners is the fourth book by Simmons and Guinn. This book is for primary teachers, especially brand new teachers who need to find quick, creative teaching materials to keep elementary children's hands busy and their brains stimulated. The Bag Ladies' Primary & Perfect is designed with a monthly format around a seasonal theme for each month of the school year from September through May, and includes a summer survival section. It is packed with theme-based learning activities, reading selections, creative writing, storytelling, and a variety of other projects arranged according to the theme. For example, in November, students read about Thanksgiving, the Mayflower, and Native Americans. Next, students write compare and contrast paragraphs about the people at the Thanksgiving table now and the Native Americans at the first Thanksgiving feast. Students can also discuss the kinds of food on the Thanksgiving table that Native Americans introduced to the European settlers. Then students decorate a Native-American Vest Pocket Bag, a brown paper lunch bag to be used to store their November projects. These kinds of literacy activities using a seasonal theme are very motivating and appealing to the young student. Each chapter contains instructions for creating organizational bags followed by three projects, writing suggestions, and six activity cards as follow-up activities at the end of each thematic unit. New teachers may want to collect the activity cards for future use by filing them in a 4x6 card box. The content is consistent throughout the book. There are 40 different activities, monthly book selections, complete step-by-step instructions, and even photographs of finished products. The instructions for each activity are easy to follow and layouts are simple and clear. The authors highly recommend adjusting the level of difficulty and selection of activities to meet students' needs. They also offer some helpful suggestions for kindergarten teachers, thus making this book very teacher-friendly. One of the highlights of the book is the variety of writing formats for all levels of writers. Bold blackline masters at the end of the book can be used for a variety of skills. The suggested materials for the activities are inexpensive and readily available. Furthermore, students are encouraged to organize each unit's projects into monthly project bags that can easily serve as personal portfolios for an Open House, parent and teacher conference, or to show their work in progress. Without any doubt, this book can rescue many new primary teachers who desperately need good, creative teaching materials for their students. Similarly, experienced teachers can incorporate these thematic units with others and have fun teaching them. The strength of this book lies in the fact that all the activities and suggestions are very easy to follow; creative and flexible for primary-level students! This is a wonderful resource book for primary teachers. -Reviewed by Dongwol Kim Roberson, doctoral candidate, Department of Bilingual Education, Texas A&M University-Kingsville for Education Book Reviews-- Education Book Reviews This book is packed full of seasonal ideas for crafts that are perfect for teachers, homeschoolers, daycare providers, and even just parents who want to find some fun and creative ideas to do with their kids. The crafts and projects in Primary & Perfect are geared toward children in grades K-2, but with a little prep work these could easily be used for preschoolers too. The crafts cover all seasons and themes throughout the year, and are divided in sections by month with fun ideas for everything from a Back-to-School Backpack craft to a Water-Cycle Bracelet craft. John David and I have been learning about families and all the different family members. I found the perfect 3-D Tree project spelled out for us in the October chapter, and we added some small pieces of paper with our family members (John David drew them) to make our own family tree. John David taped his family tree to a piece of cardboard to make it more sturdy, but was able to do most of the craft himself and all it took was some tape, construction paper, crayons and a lunch-sized paper bag! The best part about this craft was that it can be used in so many different ways and with many different lessons. You could add orange and yellow leaves and talk about fall. You could even add some pulled cotton from a cotton ball to make a scary Halloween craft. There's always green leaves and apples to talk about Johnny Appleseed. The possibilities are endless, and most of the craft projects found in Primary & Perfect can be altered easily to fit your lesson or theme. -Angie, My Four Monkeys, http: //myfourmonkeysproductreviews.blogspot.com (October 2009)-- My Four Monkeys, http: //myfourmonkeysproductreviews.blogspot.com This book published by Maupin House is one of a series of educational resources to use in teaching seasonal and thematic units. It is a treasure trove of ideas using everyday items, with complete and simple instructions as well as patterns. Ideas and projects cover every season and holida and include other topics such as animals in winter, I Have a Dream, careers, clouds, water cycle, our environment, and other writing-related activities. This is a great addition to your professional collection and has good ideas for librarians too. -Arlington Independent School District-- Arlington Independent School District

Author Information

An educator in Palm Beach County for 18 years, Cindy Guinn has taught all elementary grades, as well as serving as primary resource specialist for three years. Cindy has been nominated for the Dwyer Award for Excellence in Education, the Florida League of Teachers in 1999, and was recently nominated and featured as the Palm Beach Post's Teacher of the Week. Cindy and Karen Simmons started the Bag Ladies in 1993. Both believe in the value of keeping teachers excited and full of creative ideas. Since then, they have created 13 thematic units and presented make-n-take manipulative workshops in schools and at conferences in Florida. Their easy and inexpensive make-n-takes give teachers inexpensive and fun tools to create integrated thematic units.

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