A Rainbow of Friends: First Grade

First Grade read A Rainbow of Friends by P.K. Hallinan as a connection to creating our class Social Contract and as an introduction to the color wheel, primary colors, and secondary colors. Each student used various shaped foam stamps to paint shapes in color wheel order. The next week, once the paint was dry, they used multicultural markers to add heads, arms, and legs to the shapes. They then added basic facial features, hair, and shoes to match the shapes.

3D Shape Sort

This lesson is from a while back but I forgot to post about it. When we were learning about the attributes of 3D shapes, we visited the computer lab to create Tree Maps to sort real life examples of those shapes. The students drew there on lines for the Tree Map, used the search feature in the clipart for the 3D shape headers, and then looked through the various clipart images for examples. They had to use the skill of "click, hold, and drag" to move the clipart.

Marshmallow and Pretzel Shapes

The students used marshmallows and pretzels to model 2D and 3D shapes. As they built the various shapes, we talked about the similarities and differences between them. We talked about how many edges and vertices each had. We discussed what shapes rolled, stacked, and could slide.

3D Shape Sort

The students created Tree Maps on the computer using Pixie 2 for 3D shapes. After adding the 3D shapes under each branch, they then searched through the stickers to find real life examples of the shapes.

Shape Attributes

The students have recently been learning about the various attributes of shapes. They worked on various lessons including sorting shapes into 2D and 3D shapes. They also identified the number of edges, vertices, and faces of 3D shapes using garage sale dot stickers (it helps them identify which they've already counted). Additionally, they sorted cards of various 2D and 3D shapes into categories such as rolls, has 3 or more faces, has vertices, etc. They also made various 3D shapes out of playdough.

Playdough 3D Shapes

Kids love playdough! So, if you are looking for a way to keep them engaged in a lesson, give them playdough. While doing a lesson on 3D shapes I wanted the students to have concrete examples of how 3D shapes are similar and different. The students first made a sphere by rolling the playdough into a ball. We talked about how the sphere would roll because it was curved and had not vertices. They then flattened the top and sides a little bit to create a cube. We talked about when the sides were flattened the shape would not longer roll and that vertices and edges had formed. They then counted the number of edges and vertices. The students then flattened the top a little more to make a rectangular prism. They noticed that the edges and vertices remained the same but now the shape was longer. They connected back to prior learning about squares and square rectangles and their similar attributes. they then rolled the rectangular prism like a "snake" to turn it into a cylinder. They discovered that this shape would roll because it was now curved and the edges and vertices were gone. They then rolled just one end of the cylinder into a point to make a cone. They discussed how this shape would roll because it had a circular base but could only roll if it was on its side. They really seemed to understand the attributes of the shapes with this hands on lesson.

3D Shape Models

To help the students understand how many faces, edges, and vertices that cubes and rectangular prisms had, the students traced the sides onto construction paper. After they traced a side, they put a colored dot sticker on that side to help them remember they had already traced and counted that side. They had to follow step-by-step instructions on where to trace the sides because once they were finished, they cut out the shapes and taped them together to make the 3D models. We then counted the corners and edges.