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Presidents’ Day

February 15, 2017

Presidents’ Day is just around the corner and I thought I’d share some of my favorite resources to use in the classroom.
Presidents' Day is just around the corner and I thought I'd share some of my favorite resources to use in the classroom.
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Presidents’ Day Video

I like to start with a short video. This one gives a brief overview (less than two minutes) of Presidents’ Day. Once we have the basics of when and why we celebrate Presidents’ Day, we’re ready to dig deeper and focus on George Washington and Abraham Lincoln.

You can find even more Presidents’ Day videos here and here.

Nonfiction Books

When learning about Washington and Lincoln, there are so many books to choose from. Here are my favorites that I use for both guided reading and shared reading. You probably have them in your classroom library, too!

Here are some great nonfiction books to share with your students for Presidents' Day.

        • George Washington (National Geographic Kids)
        • Abraham Lincoln (National Geographic Kids)
        • Weird, But True: Presidents (National Geographic Kids)
        • Abraham Lincoln (Magic Tree House Fact Tracker)
        • I am George Washington (Ordinary People Change the World)
        • I am Abraham Lincoln (Ordinary People Change the World)
        • George Washington (Easy Reader Biographies)
        • Abraham Lincoln (Easy Reader Biographies)
        • Who Was George Washington?
        • Who Was Abraham Lincoln?
        • What Does the President Do?
        • Presidents’ Day (Rookie Read-Aloud Holidays)
        • Celebrating Presidents’ Day: What is a President?
        • Presidents’ Day (First Step Nonfiction)

Be sure to check out this post to find some great fictional books.

 

Presidents’ Day Activities and Resources

Since we are familiar with nonfiction text features at this point of the year, one of my favorite activities to start with is a scavenger hunt. Not only is this fun for students, but it helps them understand the way the text has been organized and gives them a preview of the information to come.

This scavenger hunt is a great activity to use when reading books for Presidents' Day.

As we begin reading, students can record information learned about each president on their graphic organizers.
Graphic organizers are a great way to record information learned from books about Presidents' Day.
Reading biographies is also a great time to work on timelines. The National Geographic Kids texts have a timeline included. After studying these timelines, we use information from Abraham Lincoln (Magic Tree House Fact Tracker) to organize important events in Lincoln’s life.
After reading about Abraham Lincoln's life, students can use this timeline activity.

 

Even though nonfiction tends to be more straightforward than fiction, I find that many of my students struggle to comprehend as quickly as with fiction. I like to use comprehension checks to make sure we aren’t moving too quickly through the texts.
These comprehension checks are a great way to make sure your students understand what they read about each president.

But that’s not all.  I also love to combine our new learning with a craft.

These crafts are a great culminating activity when celebrating Presidents' Day.

You can read more about these projects in this post.

You will find most of the resources mentioned above in these book companions:

 

To find even more ideas for Presidents’ Day, take a peek at my Pinterest board.

Happy Teaching!

Presidents' Day is just around the corner and I thought I'd share some of my favorite resources to use in the classroom.

 

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Related posts:

Picture books are a great tool to help you teach just about any topic you can imagine. Here are some great books to help introduce and celebrate Presidents' Day in the classroom. And who knows, one of these books may just inspire one of your students to run for POTUS in the future!Presidents’ Day Books for Kids Between the leprechauns and the elusive search for the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, there's no denying that kids get excited about St. Patrick's Day! As teachers, it's important to build upon that excitement and interest. I love to do that through literature. Here are some great books to read with your students near St. Patrick's Day. Some of these have great tie-ins to other curricular areas, but some are just plain fun to read!St. Patrick’s Day Books for Kids Books about Christmas Trees Christmas Chapter Books for 2nd Graders Books for the 100th Day of School
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