Keeping busy this summer making more DIY projects for my classroom! Some for my future classroom and some for my reading group class. 

RIT dyed clothespins & popsicle sticks:

SMARTY PANTS! 

I took the game Ants in Pants I got for free, added some glitter and made myself some smarty pants. This will be used seldom and at random, but when I feel a kid has asked a great question or answered a hard one, they will get some "smarties" from the smarty pants. 

This alligator is made from a dish washing tablet container, he can be used for all sorts of games in math or reading. Such as: Pick out a letter from Mr. Alligator's mouth and read the letter, or solve the problem 3 X 5 on the card. It can be adapted for any game or concept.

In my reading groups I have a hard time getting kids to follow along with their finger in the books. I made these pointers to help the students remember to follow along...

These are popsicle sticks with velcro on each end that can be used for making shapes in math lessons: 

I modge podged some scrapbook paper and glitter to the front of clothespins and hot-glued a tac to the back of them so I can easily display student work or other things on bulletin boards without poking a hole in the paper, plus it is much prettier!

I made MAGIC "E" wands out of glitter pipe cleaners and glitter foam that I glued to dowel sticks. The magic "E" wand is helpful and fun when teaching students how to say words that end in a letter "e". For example: cub ----> cube (the first vowel says it's name when the magic e is on the end of a word.)

I will end this post with my "quiet critters", I had a lot of fun making these little guys...

These will come out when a student is being extra quiet and following directions, they just might look up and see a quiet critter friend on their desk to say "thank you!" :)