"Sparkle" is a game that children will enjoy while practicing spelling. Students stand in a line, and the teacher calls out a word. The first student in the line calls out the first letter of the word. The next student in line calls out the second letter of the word and so on. If a student calls out a wrong letter, he or she must sit down and the word continues down the line. The person who calls out the last letter of word says "sparkle" to the next student in line. The student who has been "sparkled" is out. The teacher calls out another word and the game continues until only one student remains standing.
"Smell This" is a game suggested by PBS Teachers to help students explore their sense of smell. Arrange three mystery containers in the classroom with one of the following in each: lemon juice, vinegar and vanilla. Cut up fruits, vegetables and cheese into small pieces. Arrange each food in a separate pile. With blindfolds on students, have them smell the three containers and predict what the contents are. Then, students should eat a piece of food from each pile without seeing the item. After students make predictions on the foods, hold a class discussion on the five senses. Be mindful of children with food allergies in this activity.
"Ocean in a Bottle" is a craft activity that works well with a lesson on ocean life. Activitiesforkids.com suggests using rubbing alcohol, mineral oil, blue food coloring and a large water bottle for this activity. Student will also need glitter and hot glue. Craft stores sell replicas of small sea creatures like starfish or shells. Put the sea creatures and shells into the bottle to begin. Each student should fill his or her bottle halfway with rubbing alcohol. Then put in three drops of the blue food coloring and shake the contents. Fill the rest of the bottle with mineral oil. Close the bottle tightly and seal it with hot glue. Do not shake the bottle, but hold it horizontally and shift from right to left to create waves.
"Chain Reaction" is a word game to help students increase their language skills. The teacher writes a category on the board such as; food, songs, animals, plants or famous people. Each student writes the letters A through Z on a sheet of paper. As the teacher counts two minutes, students write as many words as they can in the alphabet related to the selected category. The student who creates the most words wins that round. That student can then choose a new category to write on the board and the game continues.