Purple Crayon Craft and Freebie

We wrapped up our first week of kindergarten (half-day transition schedule) yesterday with one of my favorite storybook characters, Harold:

For the first week of school, I assign a color to each day, encouraging my students to wear and/or bring an object from home that matches.  Friday was PURPLE Day.  

On Tuesday, RED Day, I observed how my Stars held their crayons and pencils, and noted if they were righties, lefties, or were still in the process of developing hand dominance.  I took notes on who applied appropriate pressure when coloring, and who knew how to write their names.

On BLUE Day I introduced scissor skills and glue stick usage, and observed who was familiar with cutting and gluing.  Several students exclaimed that they loved school because "Mom never lets me have scissors at home!"  I also made a mental note: next Thursday is School Picture Day. NO CUTTING ACTIVITY ON WEDNESDAY.  Veteran teachers will know why.

YELLOW Day saw a repeat of our scissor and glue stick skills lesson.  Each student made sure his or her thumb was in the smaller hole of the scissor handles, and that the small hole was held above the larger.  Three rectangles were cut out and then glued to a page. The rectangles were smallish.

For PURPLE Day, I thought we'd use larger pieces of paper to help students determine how much glue would be needed, and to help them slide their glue stick around the edges of each component.  It was also time to introduce a slight curve for cutting:

I created a large oval with the word "purple" in dashed font for tracing.  It's a freebie for you over in my TPT store. 

I used a 6 X 18 piece of dark purple paper, a 6 X 14 piece of light purple paper, and a 4 1/2 inch wide piece of dark purple paper cut to resemble a crayon tip.  My Super Stars traced each letter on the printable, and then cut out the oval and added it to the assembled crayon.

Once dry, the Stars enjoyed walking through the classroom, pretending to draw pictures like Harold:

Aligned with curriculum?  Check.  Developmentally appropriate?  Check.  Skill building?  Check.  Fun?  CHECK!

*****

What are your favorite first-week-of-kindergarten activities? We'll continue with scissor and gluing practice next week when we begin our literacy unit, Colors All Around (Houghton Mifflin Reading), focusing on letters Ss, Mm, and Rr.  You can find initial sound, trace, cut and glue pages in the HM reading series order in my TPT store here.  They're perfect for beginning cutters, students who need OT intervention, initial sound phonics practice, and ELA journal activities.

~Michaele~