Lessons to keep students occupied before summer vacation

If you are racking your brains trying to come up with end of the year projects to keep your students occupied, here are some suggestions to add to your collection. Shape poems (2nd and 3rd grade) – For those of you who have never before created a shape poem, this is the perfect opportunity to end the school year on something clever and fun. A shape poem is a poem written in the shape of the object it describes. First, have the students get out their Writer’s Workshop notebooks. Make sure they flip to three clean pages. On the first page, have the students think of an object. It should not be something too intricate. All they need is a basic shape. Once they have an object in mind, they need...