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Giving attention to your group assignment, search up the selected book that your group has decided upon and look up on 6 possible resource kits that you could consider for your assignment including advantages and disadvantages of using these resource kits and how you would change/adapt it.

Chosen book: "Stuck" by Oliver Jeffers

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Advantage:
Convenience; It is very easy to stick on items and it is easy to pack up. It's very feasible to set up on the classroom wall in the reading/resources area for children to interact with.
Teachers can very quickly print and laminate customized object sets (other than the objects in the book 'Stuck') to suit the lesson.
Disadvantage:
The objects in this kit are in 2D as it is made of laminated paper and magnetic sheets. They cannot reflect certain differences in the qualities of the different objects, such as their relative size, textures and material
Possible adaptations:
When printing the item images out, try as much as possible to print them such that they reflect differences in size. E.g. A car should be printed smaller than a fire engine, and a ship should be printed bigger than a fire engine.

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3. Item search and stick (onto book/play-doh)

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3. Item search and stick (onto book/play-doh)

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Advantages:
-Build awareness of where common items are located in the classroom.
-Engage the children in visual search
-Problem solving element- replacing some items with similar looking items, or through pretend play (e.g. using a gorrila if there is no orang utan available, using a farmer toy as the milkman, etc.).

Disadvantages:
-Activity may not be centralised and not all the actual household items may be found in the classroom (e.g. kitchen sink, etc.).

Possible adaptations:
-Include minatures of some household items in the resource kit/toys area for ease of access and
-Print an activity sheet/create an activity box to house all the collected items so that they can paste on the tree- The activity sheet/box

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Stuck the Story with Creative Playhouse | Make and Takes

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Storybook Summer post by Katherine of Creative Playhouse I just want to say I'm thrilled to be guest posting here at Make and Takes! Its such a fantastic website. Although I rarely blog about them on my own blog, we love books in our family.

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Advantage:
Three dimensional objects and toys can be easily used in this resource kit. Item sets can be customised to reflect different sizes, material (e.g. the wooden tree as opposed to the metal in a hot wheels car). The tree can be easily set up on a table and can be kept with relative ease.

Disadvantage:
Play dough can get messy at times and hinder educational objectives if the children are not supervised by an adult, and play dough may not be a suitable lesson material especially for children with sensory needs (e.g. They may end up fixated on breaking the play dough, stuffing play-doh beneath their fingernails, etc.).

Possible adaptations:
In the resource kit, provide a visual instruction guide to setting up as well as keeping the play dough tree items as well as rules for using the kit (e.g. This must be done on the table, etc.). The teacher can do a demonstration on how to use the resource kit prior to granting the children free access to it in the resource area.

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"Great stories happen to those who can tell them." -Ira Glas

We live in a world ruled by stories; stories told on the television, at the movies, in picture books, through photographs on the wall, or on the crayon covered paper drawn by little hands. My favorite stories are the ones told at the dinner table, in the car, or on a walk in the woods. Stories connect us to one another, entertain us, and help us relate to concepts in life.

One of my favorite story tellers is my two year old son. With the most expressive face he spins tall tales that are usually peppered with real life events, and a funny character or two. He seems to have the makings of a future author, but I'm biased of course.

One of our re-occurring favorite stories (in picture book form), and loved by my seven year old as well for its silly plot, is one of Oliver Jeffers' stories, Stuck.

"A tale of trying to solve a problem by throwing things at it." -Oliver Jeffers

I've written about my "crush" for Oliver Jeffers picture books before here. His story telling has a strong hold on us....you could say we're stuck on them!

We were reading and talking about Stuck one day when my older son was home sick from school. We had also cooked up a fresh batch of play dough and pulled out our tree blocks. It struck me later on that afternoon that we had an opportunity for story telling right in front of us.

I smashed some of the play dough down so there was ample surface area for our stories, and laid a tree block next to it so it had the appearance of a tree. Then I grabbed a container and filled it with small random objects and toys...the best kind of props for story telling.

I simply asked my boys to tell me a story with the objects in front of them. My seven year old eagerly began to work, and the two year old followed his lead.

It did not take very long for the room to be filled with tales of..."I threw my fish into the tree because I wanted to see if it was a flying fish, then I went back in time in my time machine to get a dinosaur to throw into the tree to knock it down, it was still stuck, so I threw...."
My younger son told simpler versions,"I throw Lego to knock train down. I throw car to knock Lego down."

They told, and they re-told, and kept on telling. It was a great sequencing and recall activity. They changed the objects and shared their own stories over and over... it was sticking with them.

What favorite story telling methods seem to stick with your kids? Please share your stories below!

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"Great stories happen to those who can tell them." -Ira Glas We live in a world ruled by stories; stories told on the television, at the movies, in picture books, through photographs on the wall, or on the crayon covered paper drawn by little hands.

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Advantages:
-Does not requires too much play-doh
-Tree sheets are relatively easy to create (laminated printouts) and a stack of them can be stored in the kit for multiple children to work on their trees at the same time.
-Problem solving- For items that are not so readily available, the can use play-doh to create substitutes for the actual items
-Because the adhesive being used to stick things is play-doh, you can use both solid 3D objects as well as laminated images for the items.

Disadvantages:
Play dough can get messy at times and hinder educational objectives if the children are not supervised by an adult, and play dough may not be a suitable lesson material especially for children with sensory needs (e.g. They may end up fixated on breaking the play dough, stuffing play-doh beneath their fingernails, etc.).

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4. Journey stick ->Take home sticky tree

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4. Journey stick ->Take home sticky tree

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The activity in pinterest was originally meant to be an outdoor collecting activity. Change the adhesive stick into a tree shape to fit the theme of the activity (based on the book "Stuck"). The same concept of order can be retained, but objects for sticking have to be provided (e.g. cut-outs of items in stuck such as big boat, small boat, kitchen sink,  or alternative items such as buttons, cotton balls, etc.) so as to adapt it to be an in-classroom activity instead of the outdoors (Primarily because this is meant to be for a resource kit. If an outdoor teacher supervised version of the activity was done I believe it would be really memorable for the children as well. But I diverge. )

Advantages:
- I believe the children will be more motivated and thrilled if the finished product is something that can be brought home. Concepts that are taught (e.g. order, size, etc.) will be retained better, since they interact with the objects even after class time.

Disadvantages:
- Materials in the resource kit have to be replenished if it is a take home activity (i.e. the sticky trees and the items).
- Rules have to be stated clearly for the use of the resource kit to prevent items from disappearing too quickly and depriving some students from the full learning experience (e.g. no taking repeat items, etc.).

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We recently spent a lovely morning exploring nature at the Skylarks nature reserve in Nottingham, which is part of the Wildlife Trusts. One of the activities was making something called a journey stick during a nature walk.

I'd never heard of journey sticks before, but apparently they've been around for a very long time. A journey stick is essentially a memento of a nature walk, featuring items collected whilst on the walk; these might be things like leaves, twigs, flowers, feathers or anything else natural that you find along the way.

Younger children can use a piece of cardboard with double sided tape attached to secure the items to the card. Older children can make a journey stick the traditional way by choosing a stick and attaching items to it using string or wool.

With all nature activities, you need to be mindful of protecting your surroundings. Spend a couple of minutes explaining this to children before you start, and only collect things that have fallen to the ground.

This activity really appeals to kids; it involves hunting, collecting, comparing with other children, as well as the opportunity to get creative with the stick design. We found lots of different items with a variety of shapes, colours, textures and sizes.

A Wildlife Trusts Ranger was on-hand to help us identify each item; if you were doing this on your own it would be nice to have some sort of nature spotters book with you to help with identification.

By the time we finished our walk we had two lovely records of the nature we'd seen along the way...

A journey stick is such a great activity to do with children during an outdoor trip; it keeps them busy, helps them learn about nature, and provides them with a memento to take home. You also need very little in the way of preparation; just some string or sticky cardboard, depending on which type you're making. I can see us doing this activity again and again; we'll probably end up with a gallery of journey sticks from different nature walks, which will be a lovely reminder of family days out.

Do you think you'll have a go at making journey sticks on your next nature walk?

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Nature Craft: making a journey stick - Growing Family

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We recently spent a lovely morning exploring nature at the Skylarks nature reserve in Nottingham, which is part of the Wildlife Trusts . One of the activities was making something called a journey stick during a nature walk. I'd never heard of journey sticks before, but apparently they've been around for a very long time.

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6. Writing: How I would get everything unstuck from the tree

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6. Writing: How I would get everything unstuck from the tree

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Adaptation:
-To make the question more meaningful and fun to the children, this worksheet can be paired with another "sticking things on the tree" activity as an alternative to drawing and colouring. Just to have a better balance of moving about and sitting at a table and writing. For example, if they have their own personal "sticky tree" (referring to resource #4), they could stick that on the worksheet instead).

Advantage:
- Provides an avenue of expression about what they have created and their ideas on problem solving.
-Provides a concrete work sample for teachers to find teaching and correction points or to gauge the comprehension and language proficiency of the child

Disadvantage:
- To some children, this may be a little more challenging depending on their language ability and honestly, may not seem like something very fun and engaging to be in a resource kit. (Hence it may have to tap on perhaps a more kinesthetic portion of the resource kit activity, like in the rest of the suggested resources on this padlet).

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I have been eyeing this book on amazon for a while, Stuck by Oliver Jeffers.

As luck would have it. It was finally available in paperback through a recent Scholastic book order. I received my class copy and one for our house on Wednesday. I read it to A that evening and we both really loved it.

You should check it out. The story follows Floyd's attempts at throwing various things into a tree to get his stuck kite loose. It is pretty funny.

This book is a great jumping off point for many reading comprehension topics. However, I decided to use it for a quick writing activity.

I read a portion of the book, but not how Floyd (sort of) solves his problem. I ask the students to come up with their own ideas how they would get everything unstuck from the tree and illustrate what the tree looks like.

Here are a couple of the responses.

After the students completed their responses and shared, I read the remainder of the story. My sweeties really enjoyed this book and did a good job with this writing assignment. The illustrations were great.

If you would like a free copy of this activity, you can click on the picture below.

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I have been eyeing this book on amazon for a while, Stuck by Oliver Jeffers. As luck would have it. It was finally available in paperback through a recent Scholastic book order. I received my class copy and one for our house on Wednesday.