True Friends

A friend of mine befriended a housewife – a not-so-well-to-do housewife – and they became close friends almost immediately.  One day the woman asked my friend if she could borrow a hundred plus or so dollars to buy some regular medication for her mother as she didn’t have enough.  My friend generously agreed.  She picked both the woman and her mother from their house in her car and off they went to the pharmacy. 

After getting the required prescription, my friend invited both of them to her house – for some afternoon tea and snacks.  They stayed for a few hours and then decided to take leave.  My friend asked them to wait while she went in her room to take something.  After she came out and while they were walking towards the door, she noticed her box of tissues (which was on the coffee table) inside the mother’s plastic bag (which was holding the bottles of prescriptions).  She was surprised, shocked and puzzled.  She pretended not to know it and asked the woman’s mother what was that box inside her plastic bag.  The mother said that it was ‘nothing’ and then gave a sheepish smile.  My friend looked at the daughter to see her reaction and was surprised to see her smiling and repeating the same words her mother had said. 

Outraged, she told both of them to get out of her house and promised never to see them again.  My friend felt so hurt at the betrayal.  After driving them to the pharmacy, paying for the prescription and then extending her courtesy to bring them to her home and even offered to send them home, the two of them betrayed her trust and confidence and stole from her own house.  It is not so much of the value of the tissue box but it is the value of trust that has been violated.

Weeks later, she heard from another friend of ours that that woman had been spreading rumours that my friend had accused them of stealing the tissue box and then screaming and shouting at them to get out of their house. 

You never know the true identity of a person until you really get to know him/her.  Take care.  Be careful of whom you trust.  Never be deceived by a person’s outer appearance or smooth talk.  Looks can be deceiving.

 

Crafts from Recyclables

Teachers (and parents) often spend a lot of money to buy stuffs for Art & Craft lessons.  It is really not necessary.  There are many free waste items around – plastics, paper, glass, porcelain.  We just need to look around and think creatively.  Here are some of my own and my students crafts using recyclables.  We made these during a summer workshop I organized with a group of enthusiastic teachers for elementary and middle-school students.

DIY boxes from cardboards/cartons with beads, ribbons and colored wrappers.

Photo Frame from Cardboard/Carton

Peacock from Cardboard/Carton

(As you can see, these are made by students, so don’t mind the ‘messiness’.  It’s their creativity and enjoyment that we seek.)

 

Toilet Roll Cardboard Craft

These are made from toilet roll cardboard, cut into 1/2 inch strips and bent into ‘eye’ shape or rolled into circles for the center.  Place a mirror in the center if you like or make a flower centerpiece for your wall.  The wooden base was purchased from the carpenter at 50-cents per piece – made from remnants of his woodwork.  Or you can use any hard cartons or birthday-cake bases.

(Half-done:  The student couldn’t finish within the time given so was told to complete it at home.)

Mirror or Centerpiece using cardboard/carton, plastic spoons and others

The circular part is the base from a store-bought birthday cake.  So, if you do buy cakes, keep the circular base for future use.  Very useful indeed.  I sprayed the spoon with gold-colored spray can.  Hot-glue gun pearly beads at the edge and the center.

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Using bottle caps

Using Colored Stones

Sun-burst mirror or frame using cardboard/carton, straws or BBQ sticks

Crafts using plastic from bottles

Phone pouches and aprons from old jeans 

No sewing needed – just hot-glue gun them.

Old CDs Crafts

 

Peacock Learning Tool

Hey there!  Check this out.  Another interesting Grammar lesson, with 3-D peacock learning tool.  I have to admit – cutting the template is a little time-consuming but for bigger middle-schoolers, it shouldn’t be a problem.  The nice thing is, these peacocks sit nicely on the study table – cool isn’t it?  And handy too, for fast revision of Grammar rules.  Get the template from my shop at TPT (https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/3-D-Peacock-Template-Learning-Tool-4711428)

Pretty Peacock Class Decor

Humanity has always been so impressed by the splendor and beauty of the peacock.  This magnificent bird is known to symbolize beauty, endless love, gloriousness, paradise, and grandeur.

I love the bird simply for its colorful and joyous feathers.  I feel that it’s unfair to call the peacock arrogant or proud as evident from the proverb “As proud as a peacock”.  The peacock is not being proud, he’s just displaying his feathers to woo a mate, the peahen.   That’s a natural thing to do.  We humans do that too.  We tend to show off our good sides to whomever we want to attract.

Anyways, using peacock as a theme for classroom decor plus some hearts is a great idea.  It helps to brighten up the classroom and hopefully will lighten up the students mood during lessons.  I’ve done it once in my classroom.  It wasn’t that well done but I think it will pass.  Check out some templates from my shop at TPT (https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Classroom-Decor-Poster-Peacock-Theme-3367046)

 

Beautiful Blue Butterflies

 

Blue butterflies anyone?  My students were so excited getting a butterfly each.  Of course, they’d prefer not having to write anything on it, but that’s not part of the bargain.  Each butterfly is a graded assignment.  They learn two things from this activity – the rules of another grammar topic plus the knowledge of how to make twin butterflies.  It’s a win-win situation.

Get the template and instruction from my shop at TeachersPayTeachers (https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Butterfly-Craft-4701087).

Classroom Decor Inspiration from “Inspiration Quotes”

In a month of so, most teachers will be scavenging around for ideas on classroom decor.  I just want to share my own classroom decor for the academic year 2017-2018.  My co-teacher and I decided to do something simple but couldn’t agree on anything.  Then my daughter suggested doing a ‘photo frame’ theme (as below), but instead of putting photos, we opted for ‘Inspirational Words’ or ‘Words of Wisdom’.

Source: DHGate.com

So we called up each student in our class list (we were actually still on holidays) and told them to each find inspirational quotes which inspire them and write a short paragraph of the reasons why.  We printed the quotes and mounted them on self-made frames, made out of glitter foams.  Our main color theme was blue and gold.  We added some simple decorations using ribbons and rosettes made of glitter foams.  Check out how they looked like on our classroom walls.  Getting the kids to partake in classroom decoration is brilliant as it gives them a sense of pride, belonging and responsibility in the class.

I also made my own 3-D poster of inspirational quote and posters to encourage my kids to read.  Reading is indeed the key to all knowledge.  (Glitter foams is a good choice for 3-D art)

 

 

 

 

Apple Craft anyone? Fun Ápple Book Craft.

As you know, I’m all for kinesthetic way of learning.  Grammar rules are so tough for youngsters to remember.  And yes, they have to remember so many rules from elementary through to high school.  Why not spice up the learning using fun, yet pretty crafts.  Here’s what I did with my students.  I made them write the grammar rules on colorful apple ‘slices’.  Trust me – it will really help them to remember the rules better – Grammar lessons become less stressful, more interesting and the end-products are simply gorgeous.  What is so practical about it is that, the ‘apple’ can be flattened and fit in the bags should you want the students to bring to them to school every day.  Or, they can just ‘spread’ out the slices and let the apples sit prettily on their dressing table at home.  And the best thing is that it’s cheap and simple to make.

Get the templates and instructions from my shop at ‘TeachersPayTeachers’ (https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Apple-Book-Template-4694800).