Do you know what my favorite classroom theme is? Dinosaurs. Students find them fascinating–and I do too! That’s why I’m super geeked about today’s special GIVEAWAY for Teacher Appreciation Week. You could win this fantastic bundle of dinosaur books! (There’s even a Spanish/English bilingual DVD of Groovy Joe!) How can you win? Simply reply to this blog with an answer to the following question:
What is your favorite theme or topic to teach in the classroom?
Be sure to do this before midnight on Sunday, May 14, 2017. I’ll announce the winner right here on the blog, and I’ll also notify the winner at the email address used to submit the comment.
Happy Teacher Appreciation Week!
PS: Don’t forget, Diane and Karen have special contests running all week. Check out their blog posts for more chances to win! Click here.
Update: Our giveaway winner is Joanie, who submitted comment number 7! Congratulations!
I love teaching about America – the kids love learning about the different states and finding places on the map!!
I two: in the fall, it’s A Turkey For Thanksgiving by Eve Bunting
in the spring: it’s recycling Altoid tins for projects — it’s become a minor obsession 🙂
I love teaching about the seasons. There are many great science and art lessons that you can incorporate into the topic.
The book “The Mitten” by Jan Brett! So many fun things to do!
I love teaching about endangered animals. I love the creative ideas the kids come up with to help animals. The also love learning animal facts.
I love introducing new authors and new books from favorite authors we already have.
I love to teach about historical figures using biographical books. It’s interesting to see the connections made by students when they learn more about people from the past.
Dinosaurs is one of my favorite themes. My other favorites are butterflies and bugs & insects. ????
I love teaching/exploring the ocean theme. There are so many avenues to discover and learn about. The students love this theme.
I love beginning of school with the kissing hand
I love the “Art All Around Us” theme.
I like the theme of fall, and all the activities that go along with it!
I love ladybugs so it would have to be The Grouchy Ladybug by Eric Carle!
I love teaching our farm unit.
I love 4th grade Social Studies which is NC history.
Just got finished teaching a a theme on worms. So fun and the kiddos loved it
Garden theme: great for counting,measuring,art,room decorating and more…
Right now it’s all about fossils in our homeschool!
Oregon Trail
Way cool my favorite theme is dinosaurs!!! I find that every couple of years they are finding new information on dinosaurs keep the theme exciting year after year. I
My favorite is ocean animals. The kids get so excited making all the different crafts, The movements for all the songs are so easy to learn. It is awesome
I love to teach about space.
I love teaching Colonial and early American history.
I love teaching science, especially habitats and animal adaptations.
I love teaching about Autumn season.
Animals and adaptations
Insects!
Economics!
During the fall when everything is fresh and new, I love to teach an Apple unit.
My favorite theme is community
Favorite theme for storytime is Hawai’i Our Island Home. We read AUNTIE by Stephanie Indie, TOO MANY MANGOS by Tammy Paikai, ADVENTURES OF GARY AND HARRY: A TALE OF TWO TURTLES by Lisa Matsumoto, and KAI THE ‘OPIHI GETS THE POINT by Gail Omoto, among others, and I teach a simple sitting hula to “Hawaiian Lullaby” sung by Robert Cazimero with the lyrics “Where I live there are rainbows…” We make paper flower lei and turtle puppets.
Authors and getting kids interesting in reading a series, or author.
I love teaching the class about kindness.
our favs this year were dinos, space, and animal classification!
My favorite theme to teach is space and the farm.
Favorite theme is Pete the Cat!
My favorite is anything related to math.
My poetry unit!
This is our third year of having a robin family build a nest under the deck at our preschool! It has been a great learning experience watching them hatch, feather out, leave the nest ~and begin again! Last year they had 3 clutches over the summer!
Flowers and Gardening
Native Americans
I like teaching about shapes (2D and 3D) and our fairy tales unit!
I love to teach about animals. I am passionate about them and I think this group of kids enjoy learning about it too. we really love dinosaur too.
I love teaching fall themes.
My favorite is the five senses. Especially around the holidays. There are so many things you can do with holiday themes and the five senses.
Hands Down my FAV topic to teach is potager gardening! It is an ornamental French kitchen cottage style of gardening that beautifully blends flowers and vegetables into a lovely overflowing cornucopia….
Apples!
My favorite unit would be the Circus and Rainforest!
Life cycles of frogs and butterflies.
Anything that the kids are interested in – but my favorite is probably butterflies. It was the unit I did as a student teacher and continue to just love the transformation process and how amazing it is (for both students and teachers) to see!
Life cycles of anything! Plants and animals…..the kids get so excited to see anything growing and watching living things change and grow! Their reaction to something I really don’t notice the rest of the year is why I became a teacher!
Dinosaurs was hands down the mostm popular theme. Since I teach Title One, I used the vocabulary to work on multisyllabic words. We even found dinosaurs lived in their back yards so to spesk in Arizona.
Community Helpers week is always a good one!
I love the ocean unit… It means summer is coming!
I love teaching about the seasons !
I love teaching my kids about pets. They get to learn how to care for a pet, what would make a good pet and to wrap it up we have a pet adoption and a class pet (stuff animal) the kids get to take home and write about it in a journal.
My favorite is a toss up between insects and spring!!
My favorite theme is camping.
Spring- flowers, bugs and more!
I love teaching my 3rd graders drama…from reading and understanding a script, to reading the dialogue with expression, to movement, to props, to painting a background, to performing. It’s an awesome experience!
Animals
Reptiles
Insects
Dinosaurs????????????
I did tubes and tunnels in prek this year and loved it
Ocean Animals
I love the topic or animals
Author studies. We’re currently doing one on Eric Carle and the students are loving it!
Insects, especially caterpillars and butterflies!
The ocean. I love all the animal life and the videos and the crafts. We also enend with a beach party and I bring in my giant inflatable pirate ship.
I enjoy teaching my kiddos social emotional skills.
Our reading book includes a Red, White and Blue unit for four weeks. I love It! I wear patriotic clothes everyday of the unit! We supplement with loads of books, worksheets and writing. I like it so much that the kids love it too!
I enjoy teaching the unit on spring. I also love any topic that allows me I corporate sensory activities!
I love any Fall themes and animals themes!
I love teaching about space!
I love teaching social studies topics to my first graders!
We do a unit on the life cycle of chickens (incubating and brooding included) and the students loooove it…and so do I!
I love teaching about Thanksgiving, because I use it as a time to explain how all people all over the world need to take a hint from the Pilgrims and Indians and come together with mutual respect, compassion, and peace.
My favorite is gardening and bugs!
I love teaching civics in the classroom! So fun and relatable for kids!
Winter holidays and early American history
I love teaching about the world, our country, culture, anything Science or Social Studies related!
Bugs/butterflies/frogs/worms/snail/pigs/plant life cycles
Dinosaurs
Community Helpers
I’m special
Farm
I love teaching animal themed lessons. My students love anything and everything to do with animals, especially unusual ones. We can cover science, social studies, math and ELA with any animal theme!
I love teaching about the ocean. We spend a little over a month on an ocean animal research project and it is my favorite month of the year.
I love teaching my kids about Spring and the beauty of the new season. There are so many fun books and projects to do with this time of year.
Tried a new Science-environmental inquiry project with my fifth graders! Loving it!
My favorite theme is probably the bug and insect unit because it is so much fun having the live specimens in the classroom, caterpillars, ants in an ant farm, ladybugs, etc. My second favorite is dinosaurs.
I love teaching my second grade class POETRY. It is a lot of fun and it allows the students to be silly, serious, or anything in between …. and they can use their imagination and creativity!
Electricity!
I love Spring! with butterflies and hatching eggs!! Love to incorporate Dino eggs! We go on a egg hunt and make papermache dino eggs and the kids get to hatch there own dinosaurs!
In Kindergarten, it was always “Dinosaurs and fossils” with students making a dino diorama.
Other grades, author/book studies.
My favorite theme is plants!
My favorite theme is Integrity. It’s important that kids learn the value of keeping their word and being honest at all times even when they made a foolish decision. When trust is earned, positive results happen!
I love reading The Giving Tree at the beginning of the year, and then I ask my students what they are willing to give this school year. We then create a bulletin board to leave up with all their goals and affirmations.
Along with character traits & virtues, I love teaching the unit on levers and fulcrums.
Dr.Seuss, Eric Carle, and ocean themes!
Kindness
I love using the books of Eric Carle for a year long theme
animals
Spring, including lots of bugs.
Oviparous animals, farm, and insects
I love teaching about animals and their life cycles. We are currently hatching eggs. We also have been frog eggs in an aquarium That we have been watching change into tadpoles.
I would have to say dr seuss week! Such fun things to do with the kids to encourage reading!
I love history and literature.
Author studies, dinosaurs, and oceans!
I love Shared Reading! Exposing students to different adventures through stories is my favorite!
Life cycles and ecosystems.
I love teaching life cycles, especially when we can grow something (a plant, butterflies, hatch chicks).
I love teaching about owls!
I love teaching Christmas Around the World and leaves in the fall.
Life cycle. We hatch baby ducks!
I love teaching Science.
I love teaching science and social studies.
Any kind of animal topic.
Poetry! My students loved our poetry theme this year!
I love our “Under the Sea” unit!
Poetry Unit during Poetry Month in April
Robots
I love teaching about bugs & gardening!
I love teaching about recycling
I love teaching constellations tied in with coordinate graphing!
The pond unit
My favorite study in theme is our egg study. We learn all about animals that hatch from eggs which lends itself to discussing animal life cycles and insects!
I love teaching about Spring. New beginnings and how the world comes alive again.
Insects, Animals, Farm, etc. anything the children can connect to. It varies from year to year
Moon Phases with Oreo cookies.
Humanity, this can be taught at any and all grade levels!!
Stars and planets would be my favorite topic.
I love to teach science overall but more specifically, the five senses! Activities can be so engaging and hands on that each child is involved and stays involved!
Any of the holidays! It’s always nice to get to change things up!
Science: ocean, space, farming, forest and animals! 🙂 Dinosaur Pirates and Groovy Joe look so adorable!
I love teaching area and perimeter.
I enjoy teaching about the ocean, students are very engaged!
I love teaching math. It can be so concrete, just 1 answer.
STEM based investigations
Life cycles
I enjoy using Dr. Seuss books and doing many activities to match the book of the day, especially during Read Across America week.
Empathy – the students get so involved and are shocked by what their classmates may be going through!
Our favorite topic in the class is anything that is hands on ..
Weather!
Kindergarten at the start with The Kissing Hand
I love teaching students about animals: insects, zoo animals, farm animals, amphibians, etc. They are so eager to learn!
I really enjoy teaching about Spring. So many fun opportunities to talk about new beginnings…butterflies are a fun way to do this.