Here is a great assortment of activities and links to videos, lesson plans, games, words to rap, a slide show, a timeline, and informational sites:

• Download a Constitution Day video to make a DVD for your classroom or school assembly (or show online).  Video features kids from elementary school through high school.  Great video!
• Art Activity:  For young students, paint large flags using long horizontal stokes that cross midline and use ab pattern for stripes.  For students a little older, do the same but count the 50 stars and 13 stripes as well as pattern and write a sentence or sentences (i.e. This is my flag.) using proper punctuation.
• Create a constitution for the class listing the class rules, and have all the students, the teacher and any aides sign it.
• Constitution Day, Sept. 17th
• Make a Boston Tea Party booklet.  Free printable booklet tells the story of the Boston Tea Party for grades 1-3.
• Ben’s Guide to U.S. Government for Kids: Games & Activities for grades K-2.
• Constitution Games, Lessons, & Activities for all grade levels.
• Lesson Plans for Constitution Day for all grade levels.
• Constitution Day Ideas
• Constitution Day Free Lessons to Download for all grade levels.
• The Bill of Rights Match Game for Elementary Level or Secondary Level.
• Constitution Day Rap to download (listed under grades 1 & 2).  After downloading, go to page 11 for the rap.
• Educator & Student Resources for Constitution Day

•  ‘A More Perfect Union’ Slide Show

• Centuries of Citizenship:  A Constitutional Timeline (available in Broadband version & Low Bandwidth version)
• Bill of Rights Online Game
• Hand Motions for memorizing the Preamble
• Constitution Day Resources & Lessons for Middle and High School students.
• Constitutional Fun Facts for kids.  Great for older students.
• Interactive Constitution for older students.
• Constitutional Principles: Representative Government video for High School students.
• The Founders’ Library: Thinking as a Founding Father Lesson Plans for High School students.
• National Constitution Center Resources
• The Bill of Rights
• Printer-friendly Version of Amendments 11-27
• Lesson for this standard:  “Demonstrate understanding of the issues related to the creation and ratification of the United States Constitution and the new Government it established.”

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• Values of a penny, nickel, dime, quarter, & dollar
• How many pennies in a dollar
• How many nickels in a dollar
• How many dimes in a dollar
• How many quarters in a dollar
• How many dimes & nickels in a quarter
• How many nickels in a dime
• How many pennies in a dime
• How many pennies in a nickel
• Counting by fives
• Counting by tens
• Counting by twenty-fives

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This next song is shorter, still a catchy tune, and has lyrics only on the video:

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• Penny
• Nickel
• Dime
• Quarter

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Sesame Street:  Alphabet Printable Coloring Sheets (and Numbers 1-20)
Credit: Free pictures from acobox.com

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Christopher Columbus and three ships named the Nina, the Pinta, and the Santa Maria, are well known and studied by students every year in October in remembrance of Columbus Day.  Columbus made four voyages in search of a western route to the Orient and to discover new territories, and it was the first voyage in which the three famous ships sailed the Atlantic.  Columbus was not the first European to reach America but was actually second, and he miscalculated the longitude in getting to the Orient.  However, he did have beneficial information about the trade winds which greatly helped traveling the Atlantic Ocean, and his travels were the beginning of American colonization.

FREE ONLINE MATERIALS:

• Christopher Columbus:  Easy-to-read story, picture, 8 free printable worksheets & games, and test
• Christopher Columbus from the Mariners’ Museum – History of his life and voyages:

1. First Voyage
2. Second Voyage
3. Third Voyage
4. Fourth Voyage

• Crayola Site:  Columbus Day
• Wikipedia:  Christopher Columbus

CHILDREN’S BOOKS:

• Christopher Columbus:  The Voyage That Changed the World (Sterling Biographies Series) by Emma Carlson Berne.  Good for ages 10-12.  Reveals the thoughts and emotions of Columbus.
• Columbus Day by Vicki Liestman.  Good for ages 6-8.  Presents basic facts in a simple yet very informative way.
• Junie B., First Grader:  Shipwrecked (Junie B. Jones Series #23) by Barbara Park & Denise Brunkus.  Good for ages 6-9.

• What Columbus Found:  It Was Orange, It Was Round by Jane Kurtz

DVD:

• Magnificent Voyage of Christopher Columbus (as seen on Public Television).  Educational and entertaining.

Pictured below is the Christopher Columbus Memorial Fountain at Union Station:

Credit: Free pictures from acobox.com

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We visited the Royal Gorge Bridge in Colorado with our teenage son a few years ago, and he was so impressed with the bridge that a couple of years later he chose it for a school project.  It is truly an awesome experience to walk across the lengthy bridge, look across towards the majestic mountains, look down into the immense canyon, and then ride the “world’s steepest incline railway” deep down into the canyon and look up at the tiny strand of a bridge that you have just walked across.  Pictures do not do it justice!  It is one of those “Wow!” experiences.

Here are a few facts about the bridge:

• History of the bridge
• Facts about the bridge
• Engineering facts

ONLINE VIDEO OF ROYAL GORGE BRIDGE:

• Royal Gorge Bridge & Park Video

SCHOOL PROJECT:

I wish I had taken pictures throughout all the steps of this project, but time was a factor and I didn’t.   Here are some of the few pictures I did take.   I am so glad I took these pictures beforehand because his project disappeared from the classroom and we never got it back.  It got thrown out with the trash by the janitor along with 20 other projects.   Our son received a high grade on this project so at least the teacher did see it!

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SUPPLIES NEEDED:  (and these can vary…be creative)

• A large, very sturdy foam (or wood) sheet to form the base for the project
• Large empty cereal boxes to form the brown walls on either side of the canyon
• Newspapers to make paper mache slopes and texture for the inside of the canyon
• Brown craft paint to cover the paper mache slopes
• Brown construction paper to cover the outside portions of the cereal boxes that are not in the canyon (and any part of the cereal boxes showing that are not part of the canyon) OR brown paint.  We found it easier and quicker to use brown construction paper.
• Popsicle sticks to glue together to make the base for the road part of the bridge
• Flat toothpicks to make the bridge slats over the top of the Popsicle sticks
• Wooden dowel rods and other small wooden pieces from a craft store
• Lightweight craft wire to make the cable wires for the bridge
• Silver Sharpie Permanent Marker or silver spray paint  (for the wooden pieces)
• Heavy duty tape such as duct tape
• Newspapers to make paper mache
• Glue

PROCEDURE:

• If you have never visited Royal Gorge, then I suggest watching the Online Video to give you a better idea of what the bridge looks like.
• Using duct tape or something similar, tape the cereal boxes in place along the two long edges of the thick foam or wooden base.  This forms the canyon.
• Make paper mache out of newspapers, glue and water.  Use paper mache to make the slopes on the inside of the cereal boxes to make the canyon walls.
• Paint the paper mache canyon walls and floor of the canyon with brown craft paint.
• Paint the outside of the cereal boxes with brown paint or cover with brown construction paper.  (we used construction paper)
• Use blue craft paint or blue plastic wrap to form the river at the bottom of the canyon.
• Depending on what wooden pieces you find at the craft or hobby store, look at the picture of the bridge and use your creativity to use items from the hobby shop to approximate the dimensions to scale in your model.  Color the wood with silver to represent the metal parts of the bridge.
• Glue the Popsicle sticks end to end and then lay “slats” made from flat toothpicks (cut in half or thirds) across the sticks to form the part of the bridge that cars drive across.  (This is very time consuming and you might come up with a different idea.)
• Use the craft wire to form the cables on the bridge.

CHILDREN’S BOOKS:

• Royal Gorge Bridge, “Building World Landmarks” Series, by Margaret Yuan.  Good for ages 7-14.  Describes the techniques and difficulties in building the bridge.
• America’s Top 10 Bridges by Edward Ricciuti.  Good for ages 7-12.  The Royal Gorge Bridge is included in the 10.

COUPON FOR ROYAL GORGE BRIDGE:

• Coupon for $2 off general admission ticket.  Good for up to six people.  Expires 12-31-2011.

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National Punctuation Day was founded by Jeff Rubin back in 2004.  It brings awareness to this important but sometimes overlooked skill.  Knowing how to use correct punctuation is a skill that students need and will use their entire life, but sometimes teaching about it can be a little boring to students.  Here are some ideas to help make teaching about punctuation fun:

A Listing of the Most Used Punctuation Marks:

• 13 Punctuation Marks and information about each one

Fun Activities:

• Punctuation Games

1. The Punctuation Relay
2. Wynken, Blyken, and Nod Poetry Punctuation Game
3. Pin the Punctuation Mark on the Sentence

• Punctuation Rap – view the words
• Punctuation Rap – listen to the rap

More Information:

• How to Celebrate National Punctuation Day (funny)
• Photos for National Punctuation Day (real signs and posters – examples of bad punctuation)
• Punctuation Playtime Video

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1. The first national Thanksgiving Day was originally created by George Washington to give thanks for the Constitution.
2. The U.S. Constitution is the oldest and shortest of all the national constitutions.
3. Benjamin Franklin was the oldest delegate.  He was 81 years old at the time.
4. When Pearl Harbor was bombed, the Constitution was moved to Fort Knox for safekeeping.  Now it is at the National Archives in Washington, D.C.
5. There have been 27 amendments to the Constitution out of the more than 11,000 that have been introduced in Congress.

Free Lesson Plans:

• Lesson Plans for HS, MS, and Elementary
• “Thinking as a Founding Father” Lesson Plan

Free Online Games:

• Abraham Lincoln’s Crossroads Game
• Bill of Rights Game
• Headed to the White House (student runs for president)
• Voting Rights Game
• “Which Founding Father Were You?”

Free Online Materials:

• Biographies of all the delegates
• Interactive Constitution
• Naturalization Online Test
• Print out the Constitution

Videos:

• America Gets a Constitution Video
  
• Creating the Constitution Video

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