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The Thing About Easter

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My word. 

I just spent TWO HOURS looking for a thing that never existed. Yes, that’s what I did. TWO HOURS. Why?

Well, clearly, I thought this thing existed but I could not find it.  And I cannot stand misplacing things. Especially when the thing is part of a set. 

And that’s what this thing was. It was one thing of a twelve-thing set and I could not find it anywhere. 

Worse yet, it was part of a family tradition that I have done with my son every Easter for as long as I can remember. 

Yes, he’s 14 and not really the chunky kid that I used to force into sweater vests for Easter Sunday.

But, he’s still our kid and, before we know it, he’ll be out of the house.

So, I’m going to do these holiday traditions as long as I possibly can. 

That is why I spent two hours looking for this missing thing. 

See, every year, we start celebrating Easter 12 days before Easter.

We start with a dozen plastic eggs. 

And inside each egg is one of these things. 

These things are actually little printed images on one side with a Bible verse on the other. They are nothing fancy. 

Seriously, it’s a little picture on one side and then my Sharpie-written note on the other. The note says to read a particular Bible verse. And this little thing is shoved inside a plastic egg {along with a piece of candy, of course.}

But these little things tell the Easter story when read in order.

You’ve probably seen the idea or even done some version of it yourself.

Day One: Image of the Bible on one side, and the other side says, “Turn to the Gospels and be ready to read the Easter Story.”

Day Two: Image of a donkey on one side with “Luke 19:28-35” written on the other side.

Day Three: Image of a cup and some bread on one side and “Matthew 26:26-29” on the other.

And so forth and so on. These things go all the way through praying in the garden, to placing the crown of thorns on his Jesus’ head to dying on the cross….

It’s a fun little tradition that helps us focus on the Easter story and I’ve loved doing it with my son for years! And I wanted to do it again this year!

But, when I started to get the things ready, I could not find one of the things.

I had the 12 eggs…all labeled with mismatching stickers and in random colors {told ya, nothing fancy!}

But I only had 11 things.

So, I searched and searched for that blasted missing thing. I dug to the bottom of the “spring tubs” where the eggs had been stored. I even weeded through the annoying Easter grass in my son’s Star Wars basket, hoping it had slipped to the bottom last year.  I got on my hands and knees and searched under the shelves in the storage area in the basement. 

But, it was nowhere to be found.

I had 12 eggs and 11 things.

After two hours, I finally gave up. 

I would just have to admit defeat and make a new thing to replace the missing thing.

So, I sat down with the 12 eggs, the 11 things and also the little paper that reminds me where each thing is supposed to go.

{I mean, you cannot do them out of order or the Easter story would be messed up. So, I have this cheat sheet to remind me of what goes where.}

And that’s when I discovered that not only had I wasted two hours looking for this thing, I had quite literally missed the ENTIRE POINT of Easter in the process.

See, the thing I was missing was number 11. I had nothing to put in the eleventh egg.

Well, guess what? There is NOTHING to put in that egg and there never was. Why?

Here. Read the instructions yourself.

Yeah. The eleventh egg is supposed to be EMPTY! Why?

Because the pancake-flippin’ TOMB was EMPTY!

My word.

Of course I knew that but I was so preoccupied with recreating this family tradition {while also being slightly obsessed with not wanting to admit that I had lost something,} I was missing the entire point of Easter. 

This holiday tradition is not just about making memories for our son. We want to remind him that Jesus not only died for his sins but that Jesus defeated death and rose from the grave!

It’s so easy to focus on the fact that Christ died for our sins. And He did. My word, did He ever! Thank GOD, He did that!

But, the Easter story does not end with the seventh egg. Don’t ever stop there! You have to keep reading. Because guess what?!?!

The thing about Easter is that 

the pancake-flippin’ TOMB was EMPTY!

If you are looking for an easy way to teach your kids the full story of Holy Week, check out the Holy Week Big Bundle Pack. It includes 80 pages of printables for kids PreK-4th Grade and covers the full story of Holy Week in six simple steps. 

THREE Ways Homeschoolers Can Have Some St. PATRICK’S DAY Fun

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St Patricks Day Fun for Homeschoolers

{This post may contain affiliate links. Please read our Disclosure Policy for details.} 

St. Patrick’s Day is one of those small holidays that doesn’t demand much respect. It often comes and goes in the middle of the week and all that occurs are a few green treats at school, lots of green drinks at Happy Hour and some misplaced pinching at both locations. Personally, I have never been a big St. Patty’s Day celebrant but even I believe it does deserve at least some mention to our kids. Though it’s a holiday based on both the history and myths from another land far, far away, it has somehow earned a place in our culture here in the United States. So, it makes sense to allow our kids a little Leprechaun fun alongside their homeschool studies. 

Below are THREE WAYS that homeschoolers can have some St. Patrick’s Day fun!

ONE: MAKE yummy cookies or other baked goods!

St. Patricks Fun for Homeschoolers

We love any excuse for MAKING yummy treats and if you are like us, MAKING shaped sugar cookies is a given for practically every holiday. But if you’re burnt out on those, you could try MAKING  Lucky Charms treats, green cake balls or mint brownies for St. Patrick’s Day.  All of those look and sound delicious but, my all time favorite treat for this holiday is to MAKE some cookies to accompany Leo Lionni’s book, Little Blue and Little Yellow.   All it takes is some simple round sugar cookies {you can even use store-bought, ready to eat cookies}, a small bowl of yellow frosting and a small bowl of blue frosting. Read the book, frost the cookies to blend the two colors and MAKE some fun memories while MAKING some yummy treats! {For more details, check out Little Blue and Little Yellow: an easy, fun and tasty St. Patrick’s Day Activity.}

 

TWO: CREATE a fun craft!

St. Patricks Fun for Homeschoolers

When I taught in the classroom {and also when my son was younger,} I considered the above-mentioned Little Blue, Little Yellow activity to be a sufficient example of CREATING a craft {that was eaten, of course}. But if you are a crafty mama who likes to give her kids more opportunity to CREATE, there are more than a few ideas out there for St. Patrick’s Day. Marshmallow Shamrock Stamping for the littles looks like fun {and educational too!} Shamrock Suncatchers seem like a good choice for all ages and can serve the double purpose of holiday decor. But if you have older kids with more ambition, check out these Leprechaun Traps. It looks like you can CREATE them to be as complicated and fancy as you want or keep them much more simple {which is surely what I would do!} Whichever craft your kids choose, they’ll surely have fun CREATING something memorable!

 

THREE: LEARN about the holiday!

St. Patricks Fun for Homeschoolers

As mentioned in my Valentine’s Day post, I can’t seem to let any holiday go by without expecting my son to LEARN  about it. Doing this doesn’t even need to take away from the rigor of your child’s schooling, as you can easily substitute St. Patrick’s Day-themed reading and writing for your normally-scheduled school programming. I always like to use informational reading text passages and writing prompts {which can be found in my St. Patrick’s Day Holiday Fact Pack….so convenient, right?!?!? But, really, it’s an easy and inexpensive way to capitalize on the holiday without giving up learning!}

So, whether your kids MAKE yummy cookies, CREATE something fun or LEARN about the holiday, there are loads of ways for your homeschoolers to have some St. Patrick’s Day fun!

St Patricks Day Fun for Homeschoolers

Pi Day: A UNIT STUDY Read~Write~Create~Explore~Enjoy~Learn!

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A Unit Study: Pi Day by The WOLFe Pack

{This post may contain affiliate links. Please read our Disclosure Policy for details.} 

Each UNIT STUDY includes suggestions of books to READ, ideas to WRITE, crafts to CREATE, more to EXPLORE, snacks to ENJOY and other ways to LEARN about a specific topic! To read more about the concepts behind my UNIT STUDIES, read this. 

If you find it handy to have a simplified printable of these suggestions, you can find one, along with several free printables,  here in the FREE Pi Day Unit Study Printable Pack.

Otherwise, read on for a more detailed version with links embedded! 

{Note: The links are pink! Just think, “pink link” if you are wanting to follow a link to something.}

 

INTRO: I have to admit that I have never {as a kid, classroom teacher or homeschool mom} celebrated PI DAY. I never even knew it was a thing until a few years ago when I saw something about it on FaceBook. But, as my son has been slugging his way through Algebra and Geometry this year, I decided it was high time we had some PI DAY fun around here! 

READ: Happy Pi Day to You by Bonnie Worth is a rather fun Cat-in-the-Hat book and the perfect way to start your PI DAY UNIT STUDY! It’s in the classic Cat-in-the-Hat style with silly rhyming and funny images but also pertinent facts! These books are marketed as a way to “introduce beginning readers to important basic concepts about the world we live in.” Personally, I find them to be a great way to introduce older kids to more complicated concepts in an easy-to-read style. Especially, when you use the mini Book Companion Pack found in the FREE Pi Day Unit Study Printable Pack,  kids of several ages and levels can use this book as a great intro to PI DAY.  

Sir Cumference and the Dragon of Pi by Cindy Neuschwander is part of a clever math series for kids. This math adventure is centered around a quest to rescue Sir Cumference by solving a math riddle with a magic number {that just happens to be PI!} 

Might I Interest You in a Piece of Pi? by Miftees is simply a book of PI puns. Fun and funny! 

It Happened One Pi Day by Eric Schmidt is an interesting approach to helping people {kids included} memorize the first 600 digits of PI. I personally have no interest in checking this off my bucket list but the concept is cool and it does make for an intriguing visual aid for how infinite PI really is. 

How to Bake Pi: An Edible Exploration of the Mathematics of Mathematics by Eugenia Cheng is something geared more towards adults and more math-minded teens and covers many more math topics than just PI but, for those who want to expand their learning beyond what is found at a kid-level, this is actually a fun and clever read. 

WRITE: The FREE Pi Day Unit Study Printable Pack includes three different writing activities. 

This page just asks kids to make a list of circle-shaped objects. 

Pi Day Unit Study Printable Pack Writing Activity 1

This next page allows the kids to write as many PI facts as they can inside the lined circle. 

Pi Day Unit Study Printable Pack Writing Activity 2

And this third page is a bit more fun and engaging. It asks kids to write three full PI facts but then to write .14 of another fact. That last partial fact is then used as a way to see if anybody can figure out the rest of it! 

Pi Day Unit Study Printable Pack Writing Activity 3

LEARN: If you don’t have access to any of the books mentioned or if you are a mama like me who tends to “plan” short notice, no worries! I’ve got ya covered with this Pi Day Fact Pack.  It’s simple and to the point but fun with a few ways to look at the most important facts of PI along with a few activities to cement the concepts. It’s not free but with discount code HappyPIDay, it’ll cost less than $3.14! 

Pi Day Fact Pack

CREATE: This Sidewalk Chalk Pi Activity not only teaches all about PI, it disappears in the rain and doesn’t need to be stored! Gotta love that! 

This free Pop Art Pi Page is super cute and involves just coloring a whole bunch of circles! Younger kids can do it in a simple fashion while older kids could definitely turn it into a work of {pop} art! 

But my absolute favorite way to explore PI in a creative way is this PI in the Sky Cityscape! Not only does it allow kids to see the actual digits of PI, it allows each kid to take the number as far as they want. Plus, it can be done super simple with graph paper and colored pencils or watercolors can be used to turn it into a real piece of art! 

ENJOY: What to eat for PI DAY seems pretty obvious to me: PIE! But, I suppose you could make things a little more well-rounded, ha ha ha, and serve circular food all day long!

Pancakes or Eggos for breakfast would be fun!

Lunch could be either uncrustable sandwiches or something served on pita bread. Both would be great with sliced cucumbers on the side. 

Dinner would need to be pizza, of course!

And, then pie for dessert!

EXPLORE: {You may want to start your PI exploration by printing out this free visual aid.}

Legos are a family favorite around here but we usually use them just to create elaborate Star Wars ships but when I saw the idea to build PI out of Legos, I knew we needed to give it a go! It’s really simple. You just need a written/printed version of the number PI, a baseplate and several square Legos. Some call it a 3-D Cityscape of PI. Others call it a Pi Graph. We just called it hands-on fun and a great visual representation of PI! 

Pi Day Unit Study Lego Activity

Here is a link to an easy hands-on activity for nearly all ages. It shows how to easily explore PI with string. 

And here is a link to a much more complex hands-on way to explore PI. It is geared for older kids and will take more time but it allows for a concrete understanding of diameter, PI and circumference. 

This link takes you to the annual Pi Day Challenge. It does require you to sign up but the process is quick and simple and then gives you access to some very cool but challenging online PI-related puzzles. 

If you have an early learner who wants to join in on the PI DAY fun, here are a few simple Pi Day activities for them. They’re more circle-related than focused on PI, but still fun for the little ones!

There are loads of free videos that cover the topic of PI. Here is a super quick {less than two minutes} video that showcases pies to teach about PI.  

Brain-Pop has one that lasts 3 minutes and 14 seconds {so clever of them.} 

And, here’s the best one, in my opinion. It’s from TedEd and does a great job of explaining the history of PI and how we still use it today…and all under 4 minutes. 

But, if you want to take this PI thing well beyond simple circles, check out this Your Life in Pi video. It’s mind-blowing!

A Unit Study: Pi Day by The WOLFe Pack

Valentine’s Day: A UNIT STUDY Read~Write~Create~Explore~Enjoy~Learn!

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{This post may contain affiliate links. Please read our Disclosure Policy for details.} 

Each UNIT STUDY includes suggestions of books to READ, ideas to WRITE, crafts to CREATE, more to EXPLORE, snacks to ENJOY and other ways to LEARN about a specific topic! To read more about the concepts behind my UNIT STUDIES, read this. 

If you find it handy to have a simplified printable of these suggestions, you can find one, along with several free printables,  here in the FREE Valentine’s Day Unit Study Printable Pack.

Otherwise, read on for a more detailed version with links embedded! 

{Note: The links are pink! Just think, “pink link” if you are wanting to follow a link to something.}

 

INTRO: As you probably know, I used to be a classroom teacher. I loved so many things about my job but celebrating various holidays in my classroom was NOT one of them. Don’t get me wrong, we always had fun and celebrated with games, snacks and whatnot but it was stressful and left me exhausted at the end of the day. Not to mention, somehow even the smallest of holidays seemed to have a lasting impact on the kids’ attention spans and learning capacity that lasted an entire week. It took me a few years to realize that it did not need to just be cupcakes and Bingo to create a celebration. And, as soon as I adapted our holiday celebrations to include actual educational opportunities, the exhaustion and chaos seemed much more worth it! So, when I started homeschooling, I opted to use that same approach. So, with every holiday that rolled around, we did a UNIT STUDY and learned loads of new stuff! And, Valentine’s Day is the first of many small holidays heading your way! 

READ: There are so many Valentine’s Day books out there! As always, I suggest checking out your local library.  Chances are, they have a great selection already identified and ready for check-out! Of course, Amazon is also a great option…as long as you plan at least two days ahead. 😉 But, wherever you find your books, here are a few of my faves….

For the youngest set, I adore Babies Love Valentine’s by Holly Berry-Byrd. It’s a lift-the-flap board book designed to introduce babies and toddlers to the common elements of Valentine’s Day. It’s simple, sweet and durable!

For early readers, I really like Love from The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle. It’s short and sweet and features the world’s most famous caterpillar using his favorite foods to show off what love means to him. 

Another fairly simple but fun book that is perfectly adaptable for Valentine’s Day is Love from the Crayons by Drew Daywalt. It features a series of crayons explaining why love can be red or purple or brown or green. It features a repetitive text but also includes some more challenging words and phrases which allow for great opportunities to expand vocabulary. 

A silly option,  that still offers great life and literacy lessons is Roses Are Pink, Your Feet Really Stink by Diane de Groat. It’s about a possum who struggles to write a kind Valentine card for a few of his classmates. Because of the way he feels, he ends up writing some less-than-kind words, but, in the end, the classmates work through their issues and everybody has a happy Valentine’s Day! It’s a sweet and relatable story for sure! But my favorite part is the silly rhyming that the book presents. Rhyming is so important for early readers and writers and, the sillier, the better when it comes to this age-range {6-9 years old}.

Though it’s not really a Valentine’s Day book, I absolutely love  A Book of Hearts by Jessica Laurel Kane. It’s a thought-provoking book about all sorts of hearts, including a golden heart, a sensitive heart, a brave heart, a mourning heart and more. It’s not your typical Valentine’s Day story because it’s not all happy hearts, for sure,  but it does end with an “understanding heart” which implores us to love all types of hearts we find along the way. It’s a big lesson provided for small people in a short book. I highly recommend it! 

WRITE: For a couple of different writing activities, look no further than the FREE  Valentine’s Day Unit Study Printable Pack.

It includes this cute and simple activity that coordinates perfectly with Love from The Crayons by Drew Daywalt but can also be used on its own. There are even two styles; one with primary lines and one with standard lines. 

Also included in the FREE  Valentine’s Day Unit Study Printable Pack, is this cute and clever poem-writing activity. It was designed to be used with Roses Are Pink, Your Feet Really Stink by Diane de Groat but is a perfect activity to use with kids of all ages, with or without the book! 

CREATE:  These Tissue Paper Stained Glass Hearts are not only super cute, but they are also cheap, easy and NOT MESSY! Oh! And they’re very easy to display as decor and store year after year. All you need is some clear contact paper and tissue paper. That’s it! Seriously! My son and I made some a decade ago and I still pull them out every year to stick on the windows in February! 

Another fun, but a wee bit messier, craft is this I Love You To Pieces Mosaic Heart. The included instructions are designed to make a card to give to somebody it could also be simplified to just make on a piece of construction paper. It requires tearing colored construction paper into small pieces and gluing them onto a heart. It’s a great activity for littles and bigs alike!

ENJOY:   Starting the day with these adorable Sheet Pan Heart Bear Pancakes would be super fun. You could even prep them the night before to make the morning easier. I might be tempted to modify these instructions to just use heart-shaped cookie cutters, instead of bears, and slice some strawberries the easy way. But, either way, it does not look like too much work at all and I can safely say I almost always have those ingredients on hand {just pancake mix and strawberries!}

For lunch, use that heart-shaped cookie cutter again and create this Valentine Sandwich Snack! The instructions include making homemade strawberry jam, which would be a very unlikely use of time in our home, but the rest of it is easy peasy and too cute! You basically use a cookie cutter to cut a peep-through hole in the top piece of bread. What you put in the sandwich could be anything!

LEARN: For an easy way to work on pertinent literacy skills while learning about some of the fun facts associated with Valentine’s Day,  check out this Valentine’s Day Holiday Fact Pack.  It introduces your 3rd-6th graders to a variety of topics including conversation hearts, St. Valentine, cupid, chocolate candy and more through Informational Text, Comprehension        Questions, Writing Prompts and more! Use discount code 25OffVAL, to save 25%. {Or, if you bought the Celebrate It! Digital Grab Bag, you’ll find it in there!}

EXPLORE:  A great path to take if you want to explore more for Valentine’s Day is to focus on the science of the most important muscle in our bodies, the heart! Here is a 5 minute video explaining what the heart is and  how it works. It’s great for all ages! And here is a fun, and fairly simple science activity that shows how the heart works. It requires a balloon, small jar, cup, two bendy straws, some tape and water. That’s it! You can also snag some free printables here that allow your kids to color an image of a heart using a color-coded chart. 

You may also want to check out this Pinterest Board.  It has a carefully curated collection of ideas of how to teach about and enjoy Valentine’s Day in your homeschool! 

AND, as a BONUS for this UNIT STUDY, several of my blogging buddies have contributed their own Valentine’s Day-themed posts. There are some awesome ideas included. Check them out!

1. If your kids need inspiration for creative writing, try these fun writing prompts and tips {plus a free printable}, Inspire Creativity in Your Children + Gnome Writing Prompts from In All You Do. 2. If you want some additional STEM activities, check out these 10+ Awesome Valentine’s Day STEM Activities for Kids from Hess Un-Academy! 3. To learn more about the all-time most favorite food for Valentine’s Day, check out the post Chocolate Secrets from Julie Naturally. 4. For additional info on the history behind the holiday, head over to read The History Behind Valentine’s Day from Homeschool on the Range. 5. Do a quick 15-minute music lesson for Valentine’s Day while listening to some of the greatest ever Love Songs from Musicals from Music in Our Homeschool. 6. Try these DIY Felt Fortune Cookies Valentine’s Day Craft + free Valentine printable from Making Room 4 One More. They’re so simple, that your kids can help make a batch! 7. For some additional literacy learning, try these Valentine’s Day Language Arts Resources for Homeschooling Families from Whole Child Homeschool. 8. For something sweet, whip up a batch of Make Some Easy Sweetheart Popcorn For Valentine’s Day from Our Crazy Adventures in Autismland. 9. If you want to go big and have an actual party, check out How to Have a Valentine’s Day Homeschool Party from Everyday Graces Homeschool. 10. For another sweet concoction, try this Valentine’s Chocolate Pudding Cream Cheese Frosting from Homegrown Motherhood. 11. For several more book ideas, check out 27 Valentine’s Day Books for Kids from Heart and Soul Homeschooling. 12. If you want to take your snickety snacks to the next level, here are some 5 Valentine’s Day Snacks that Teach About God’s Love from Stand Up, Reach Out! 13. Here are several ideas to go along with a special book: Story Time: Somebody Loves You, Mr. Hatch from Orison Orchards. 14. You know I’m all about simple snacks! Here are 15 Fast and Fun Valentine’s Day Snacks for Kids from Thrive@Home! 15. For a craft with a purpose, check out this DIY Valentine’s Day Craft Ideas – Beautiful Heart-Shaped Upcycled Book Decorations from Geez, Gwen!

Martin Luther King Jr: A UNIT STUDY Read~Write~Create~Explore~Enjoy~Learn!

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{This post may contain affiliate links. Please read our Disclosure Policy for details.} 

{This post may contain affiliate links. Please read our Disclosure Policy for details.} 

Each UNIT STUDY includes suggestions of books to READ, ideas to WRITE, crafts to CREATE, more to EXPLORE, snacks to ENJOY and other ways to LEARN about a specific topic! To read more about the concepts behind my UNIT STUDIES, read this. 

If you find it handy to have a simplified printable of these suggestions, you can find one, along with several free MLK printables,  here in the FREE MLK Unit Study Printable Pack.

Otherwise, read on for a more detailed version with links embedded! 

{Note: The links are pink! Just think, “pink link” if you are wanting to follow a link to something.}

 

INTRO: I am seriously embarrassed and downright ashamed to say that we have never done much to celebrate Martin Luther King Jr Day in our homeschool. We have learned about him in our history lessons multiple times over the years but we have never actually celebrated the national holiday and the man behind it. But, after being inspired by something I discovered in the  Celebrate It! Digital Grab Bag, I am determined to rectify that this year! 

READ: As you can imagine, there are loads of books about Martin Luther King Jr. I’ve narrowed this list down to just a handful geared towards a few different levels of readers.

Happy Birthday, Martin Luther King by Jean Marzollo is a pretty simple book which makes it great for early readers or as a family read aloud. It touches upon the civil rights issues of the day but in a child-friendly tone. It also tries to highlight why his birthday is a national holiday which makes it the perfect choice for January. 

Despite the fact that the big-headedness of the cover illustrations bother me, I usually like the content of the Who Was series, and Who Was Dr. Martin Luther King Jr by Bonnie Bader does not disappoint. It’s a short chapter book that covers the entirety of his life and even includes a timeline. It was written for 3rd Grade+ and opens up a whole lot of discussion doors on civil rights, segregation, discrimination, protests, etc. but in an appropriate manner for this age group. Another good option from a newer series, in case those big-headed covers of Who Was creep you out too, is The Story of Martin Luther King Jr.: A Biography Book for New Readers by Christine Platt. It is written with the same audience in mind as the Who Was series and does a great job of covering MLK’s life too. 

For slightly older kids, I highly suggest Martin Luther King: The Peaceful Warrior by Ed Clayton. Unfortunately, it looks like it’s kind of hard to come by on the internet but your library may have a copy. Mine did! This book was written by somebody who worked directly with Martin Luther King Jr. and, therefore, has a much more REAL feel to the book, as opposed to one written by an unimpacted author who just pulled info from a Google search. But, it is still presented in an appropriate manner; just be prepared for deep conversations about segregation and racial inequalities to spring up. 

You can also use this fun and free MLK Mini Book Pack. It includes two options: one with text and one without so it is appropriate for more than one level. It covers MLK’s life in ten steps but leaves the detailed history up to you. If you want to just introduce your younger kids to MLK in a most basic fashion, this book would do just that. But, you can certainly expand on each step with more discussion. It is free and available on its own but is also found in the  FREE MLK Unit Study Printable Pack.

And because I am trying really hard not to spend precious time reinventing the wheel, here is a link to a very thorough list of MLK book suggestions from Peanut Butter Fish Lessons, divided into age categories. 

WRITE: For younger kids, there is this quick and simple Writing Activity. It is part of the FREE MLK Unit Study Printable Pack. This activity can be tailored to writing about a child’s own personal dreams or to connecting their own child-sized civil rights dreams to that of  MLK. 

For older kids, the FREE MLK Unit Study Printable Pack also includes a couple of writing prompts that ask the kids to think about and respond to issues related to racial segregation and discrimination.  There are two styles of lines to accommodate two levels of writers. 

LEARN:  For an easy yet thorough introduction to MLK, check out this Martin Luther King Jr Fact Pack. It introduces your 3rd-6th graders to the life of MLK with ten pages of Informational Text Passages and Comprehension Questions and includes information on his childhood, family life, education, church leadership, civil rights work and death. It does cost a wee bit but with discount code 25OffMLK, you’ll save 25% which means it will only cost a wee-wee bit {like less than a fancy coffee at McDs wee bit!}

CREATE:  This super cool art project was what inspired me to finally put together some lessons for MLK! What I really like about this is that it’s not just an art project. It’s an art project that makes ya think! AND, it’s easily adaptable to a wide range of ages. The instructions ask the kids to draw little icons but it also includes a version where you can just print them out for smaller kids. But, we skipped the icons altogether and decided to write out definitions. I LOVE how it turned out! 

This is the example from the creator…so, obviously much prettier than ours! We got this project as part of the Celebrate It! Digital Grab Bag which was a GREAT DEAL and included all sorts of great resources. If the sale is over, I’d still head on over there to check out the site and sign up so you are hooked up for future sales. 

EXPLORE:  If you and your kids want more MLK, you’ll find a couple of videos below. Depending on age, you may want to watch with your kids.

You may also want to check out this Pinterest Board.  It has a carefully curated collection of ideas of how to teach about and celebrate Martin Luther King Day! 

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