I have finally got around to completing the My Body Theme activities and resources! I know many of my readers and subscribers like to complete this theme close to the start of back to school (although I tend to teach it to my students in the Spring as part of moving and growing). You could also pair this pack up with the Dental Health Theme Activities and the All About Me Activities!
I created an emergent reader that is perfect for young enthusiastic readers. It repeats high frequency words and subject-specific words are emphasized in bold. You could leave it black and white, or you could have children use it as a coloring book. In the past I have given children a page each to color then assembled the book to create a ‘class book’ for our library. I laminated it for extra durability. The sentence building cards also work great with the emergent reader book. Children can be encouraged to match the sight words and find the subject-specific word using the picture and/or printed text. It’s a great introduction to sentence construction, you could point out how a sentence starts with a capital letter and ends with a period (full-stop).
For more advanced learners, there is a worksheet that consolidates the emergent reader and sentence building cards. The ‘Read, Trace, Build’ worksheet combines all aspects and gives pupils the opportunity to work independently! It also encourages the development of scissor skills by requiring the student to cut around the rectangle and squares.
Still in the realm of emergent reading, the 3 Part Cards will again help build subject-specific vocabulary as well as visual perception development. Children are encouraged to lay out the control cards and find the matching picture and words. With my preschool aged students I tend to have them match just the picture and my prekindergarten aged children do the picture and the word. When they have completed the task you can also extend the activity by asking questions, ‘Where is your _____?’, ‘What is this?’, ‘ Can you point to the _____?’, etc.
I’ve also created ‘Read, Trace, Make’ cards that I like to use with prekindergarten children. This activity encourages letter formation and letter recognition. I often give my students wooden letters or magnetic letters to create the word. If you are looking to add a fine motor element you could add playdough to this task. You could encourage pupils to roll out the playdough into ‘sausages’ which they could then form into letters!
The Vocabulary Set offers you three options to increase awareness of the body parts. I like to use all three at some point during the My Body Theme. First, the word wall cards, you could use in a subject themed word wall or print two sets and have children match them.
Secondly, I have added pocket chart words. You could use this as a display or as a learning activity for older emergent readers. Thirdly and probably my most favorite (am I allowed a favorite?) the baseball card sized word cards. I love these because I use them to create a class picture dictionary. In the past, I have hidden these cards around the room. The students have gone on a scavenger hunt to find them then we use them to create another page in our picture dictionary!
If you are looking to increase independent learning the My Body Task Cards are ideal for this. As an added bonus they also develop fine motor and visual perception skills! There are differentiated versions of this activity to meet the vast needs of your students. You can have pupils match picture-to-picture or picture-to-word. I have also included these with a blank background if you have students that need to have less visual distraction to focus, for example, a student with SPD or ASD (ASC). I like to include a variety of tools for children to select the correct answer, such as, clothes pegs, bull dog clips or paper clips. Anything that will get their little muscles working!
Another fabulous task that children could work on independently is the Body Part Sorting Mats. These use real images of body parts. Children encouraged to sort the body parts out either working alone or as part of a group (it’s a great group task to develop team building and cooperation skills). You could use it as workstation task and include Velcro so the images stay in place. Also, ideal for students with Autism as I have added a plain background alternative (also great if you are trying to save on printing costs). You also do not have to sort all the body parts at once. For example, you could start with the head and have cards for the head and the arms, the student would then have to decide which ones they needed.
I like to include visual perception tasks in my packs for many reasons. Mainly because it is such an important area to develop in children. Everything depends on visual perception – reading, maths, problem solving, self-help skills, to name but a few. The more you can include the better your students will be for it, this is why I like Shadow Matching Cards! These cards will develop visual discrimination, visual memory, visual form constancy AND visual closure!
Finally, I have added a resource that will help increase social development skills – BINGO! The My Body Bingo comes in two sets for preschool and prekindergarten. I have included calling card and a checklist, mainly for my own benefit as I cannot recall how many time I get distracted calling and then students get frustrated correcting me! It’s a great way to stay organised and also an added tool if you wish a student to be a caller.
The players mats come in two sets, one with pictures and one with pictures and words. There are also cards that you can print to give to children to cover their pictures. Alternatively, as I often do, you could laminate and have pupils cross out their items with a whiteboard pen or they could place a counter on top.
Not all items have been highlighted – the post would never end if I did! There are also some bonus items that have not been mentioned either. Thank you for stopping by, if you would like a copy of the activities shown today click the link below!
