This spider slime play recipe for kids is full of fine motor practice and perfect for the keeping kids busy! And it's not as messy as you think!
Here are 20 fun spider facts for preschoolers and kids.
One of my favorite stories to read in October is Aaaaarrgghh Spider! by Lydia Monks. It is such a cute story and my students really get a kick out of it! If you haven't read this story yet, it's about a spider that decides he wants to be a pet spider. He shows a family all the things that make him a great pet, but all they see is a scary spider! And coming from somebody who truly dislikes spiders, I think it is a really cute story! Ha! After we read the story, we made a class graph to analyze whether we think spiders do or don't make good pets! Then we used this graphic organizer to recall what the pet spider did in the story. Since this was for our pre-write we just wrote one or two words in each bubble instead of a whole sentence. For example we wrote "feed itself" or "dance". After that, we used what we brainstormed to complete our opinion writing prompt: "A spider makes a _____ pet because..." The students wrote whether they thought a spider would make a good or bad pet and then supported their reasoning using evidence from the book. Of course we had to make a cute spider craft to go with our writing ;) I found these adorable spider buttons at Jo-Ann Crafts and Fabrics and I knew I had to add them to our math centers! The pumpkin ice cube tray from the dollar tree makes the perfect ten frame! To play, have your students roll the die and place that many spiders in the ten frame. Then using a different color, figure out how many more spiders are needed to make a ten. You can download this mini spider unit in my shop for free by clicking the image below!
Do you teach about creepy, crawly creatures in your classroom??!! I may not teach science, but I sure do love to integrate nonfiction books about
Read The Very Busy Spider and then do some fun hands-on activities to go along with the book.
One of my favorite stories to read in October is Aaaaarrgghh Spider! by Lydia Monks. It is such a cute story and my students really get a kick out of it! If you haven't read this story yet, it's about a spider that decides he wants to be a pet spider. He shows a family all the things that make him a great pet, but all they see is a scary spider! And coming from somebody who truly dislikes spiders, I think it is a really cute story! Ha! After we read the story, we made a class graph to analyze whether we think spiders do or don't make good pets! Then we used this graphic organizer to recall what the pet spider did in the story. Since this was for our pre-write we just wrote one or two words in each bubble instead of a whole sentence. For example we wrote "feed itself" or "dance". After that, we used what we brainstormed to complete our opinion writing prompt: "A spider makes a _____ pet because..." The students wrote whether they thought a spider would make a good or bad pet and then supported their reasoning using evidence from the book. Of course we had to make a cute spider craft to go with our writing ;) I found these adorable spider buttons at Jo-Ann Crafts and Fabrics and I knew I had to add them to our math centers! The pumpkin ice cube tray from the dollar tree makes the perfect ten frame! To play, have your students roll the die and place that many spiders in the ten frame. Then using a different color, figure out how many more spiders are needed to make a ten. You can download this mini spider unit in my shop for free by clicking the image below!
10 free coloring pages! Symmetry is sometimes a difficult concept to explain, this art activity can help! Download, print, fold, and trace!
30 spider activities for teaching and learning about spiders in your preschool, pre-k, or kindergarten classroom. Perfect for a fall or Halloween theme.
Let your kids take charge in mixing up their own playdough to make this super simple Incy Wincy Spider craft.
Morning Invitations probably saved my life as a mama. I said this on Instagram a couple of years ago and immediately started fielding questions about what was a morning invitation? Did I really do this every day? Wasn’t it a lot of extra work? I wrote a post about the life changing powers of these […]
We made some cute Halloween decorations the other day. I do love all hand print and fingerprint art projects. 🙂 I saw the idea here on The Mother Huddle. She used black paint and googly eyes…..neither of which we had. Purple looks cute too, though. I just cut out the eyes and used a sharpie […]
This is a list of step by step instructions to make beaded spiders. Let's get started. Tools: Wire cutter Bent or Straight Nosed Pliers Supplies: 24 or 26 Gauge Wire or Cut Head Pins Large and Small Bead Combinations Broach Pin or Lapel Pin Blank All items are available at Craft and Hobby stores. Cut one wire as the body wire for each spider, it should be long enough to wrap around both beads and make a loop for a necklace or secure a broach pin. I used body wires that measured 4 to 4 1/2 inches or 10 1/2 to 11 centimeters. You can adjust your body wire depending on the size of your beads. Cut four wire legs for each spider. I used legs that measured 2 1/2 inches or 7 centimeters. Put the Head and Body bead on the body wire, be sure to leave a space for the legs. Bend the body wire around both beads, then twist the ends to secure the beads. Be sure to leave a space for the legs. Bend the leg wires in half. Add the leg wires one at a time. Twist the leg wire around both parts of the body wire (keeps the legs from being loose). Bend each leg wire in half, so the legs look like the letter M behind the head. Spread the legs as needed to space them out. Use your pliers to bend the tip of each leg to make feet. Use the ends of the body wire to make a loop for a necklace or to secure a broach pin. If a broach pin is too bulky, you can also use a blank lapel pin which can also be found at most craft stores. Congratulations, you are done. I hope you found the instructions to make beaded spiders clear and easy to follow. Please let me know if you have any questions or if I missed anything. Enjoy Your Spiders!
Hi! I am a Kindergarten teacher and I love it! I love to share my ideas with other teachers! I am always looking to be inspired to create new games and centers for students. Being a teacher is a wonderful blessing and I believe that kindergarten is a very special place!
In honor of Martin Luther King Day, today’s blog is about Black (African) pirates during the Golden Age of Piracy. First let’s get our terminology straight. Every once in a while, I run into someone who wants to call these people “African American Pirates.’ Sorry, guys. “African American” is a term that only works in the United States of America. Since, during piracy’s Golden Age the US had not yet broken free from England, there were no African Americans at the time. However, the terms that were in use are not specific, mostly because these people were not viewed as a homogenous group. Some were slaves. Some were slave owners. Some, as we shall see, were Dutch, or French. The story of many Black pirates was at many times also the story of slavery. Since the first founding of colonies in the New World, European countries scraped up their poor, or occasionally just their unlucky, and forcibly shipped them off to New World colonies as “indentured servants.” That the term of servitude (often 7 years) outlasted life expectancy in the harsh new colonies (sometimes as little as 2 years) bothered the authorities not at all. However, ship captains bent on kidnapping prostitutes, thieves, beggars and gypsies for transportation sometimes also scooped up relatives of the rich and powerful. By 1700, indentured servitude was on the decline. Landowners looking to acquire lifelong or hereditary workers also enslaved non-Christians. This could be done under the excuse that by “Christianizing” these people, the slaver owner was benefiting them. But problems surfaced when Jews, Muslims, Native Americans or Africans converted. Could Christians be held as hereditary slaves? Disputes also broke out about what constituted a Christian. Catholic Spain and France claimed that Protestants were non-Christians, while Protestant England said the same about Catholics. By 1700, the vast majority of slaves brought to the West Indies, the area that we now refer to as the Caribbean, were Black people from Africa. Pirates had long had problems with slavery. Beginning in the 1600’s, pirates who captured slave ships often gave the slaves an opportunity to join their crews. In the beginning, human cargo on captured ships might amount to 6 or 7 people. By the 1700’s, purpose built slave ships were carrying hundreds of slaves from Africa. Capturing a slave ship could vastly increase a pirate captain’s power. At one point, pirate captain Sam Bellamy’s crew consisted of more than 50% freed African slaves. Bellamy’s friend Blackbeard had a crew that was estimated at 30% African. In fact, some historians believe that Blackbeard’s famous black beard came from African heritage. Some people even claim that Blackbeard was the offspring of an English nobleman and a mulatto (half-African) servant. Will we ever know for sure? Probably not. But descriptions of Blackbeard’s appearance make this plausible. We are certain that a Black pirate who called himself Black Caesar was a pirate captain who occasionally ran with Blackbeard, and was with him when Blackbeard fought his last action against the Lieutenant Maynard of the Royal Navy. Caesar had been given the duty of blowing up the ship if it looked like the pirates would not win. Though willing to carry out his suicidal mission, he was stopped by two (presumably white) pirates with less bravery. The problem with these African pirates is that, like most working pirates of their day, their stories remain untold. But a few names are noted in history. Hendrick Quintor, for instance, was a skilled Dutch sailor of African origin. He joined Bellamy’s crew when the Spanish brigantine he was sailing on was captured. Quintor was one of the few pirates to escape the disastrous hurricane that sank Bellamy’s flagship. Quintor was tried with his fellow pirates, and found guilty. But unlike the others, he and John Julian, a Native American pirate, were sold into slavery. It is noted that both men made bad slaves, but their ultimate fates remain unknown. Was it better or worse than facing the hangman’s noose, the fate of the other members of Bellamy’s crew? Other black pirates of note include Diego Grillo, a man of African descent who was born in Havana. He took up the pirate trade in the 1630’s. He was esteemed by his comrades, and was elected to the post of captain. The legend of Diego Grillo has attached itself to many Black Caribbean pirates from the era. One Spanish priest writes of being captured by Grillo, and states that the pirate captain felt a particular hatred of the Spanish, who had enslaved him, and that Grillo made a special effort to burn Spanish ships. Grillo is said to have made his base either Tortuga or New Providence, the later home to the Pirate Republic. Some even claim that he was a ship’s captain during Morgan’s raids against the Spanish. A pirate by the name of Old South, a Black man, is said to have captained one of the many pirate ships called the Good Fortune. In 1731 Juan Andres, a man of mixed African heritage, was the leader of a pirate crew of runaway slaves and Indians. They plundered along the coast of Venezuela. Authorities assumed Andres had died two years later when the attacks ceased. In reality, Andres and his crew had merely moved to the safety of Curacao before resuming their assaults. Peter Cloise, a former slave, became a pirate after Edward Davis took him from his owner in 1679. They became close friends and went pirating in the Caribbean and along South America’s Pacific coast. After Davis’ ship put into Philadelphia in May 1688, Cloise was arrested, but no records of his execution have been found. Stede Bonnet, the gentleman planter who turned pirate to get away from his nagging wife, summed up the piratical attitude when settling a dispute between one of his African crew members and a white recruit. Stede’s judgement was that piracy was a race in itself – it trumped color, nationality and station of birth. A man who called himself a pirate could never be called a slave. So, to all those who were confused by the recent hullabaloo about Paymobile offering a Black pirate with a slave collar around his neck... It's a valid image if you change one thing... The pirate should be holding the slave collar in his hand (having just ripped it off his own neck) and he should be waving a pirate flag!
