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Home Education Magazine
January-February 2004 - Articles and Columns
Read All About It and More! - Doris Schuchard
Think newspapers and magazines are only good for reading? Then you need to try Puzzle Pictures, Newspaper Mad Libs(R), or Comic Capers. Here are some fun ways for your kids to play with words and learn a little something, too! Each of these activities require little preparation, materials and space, so try them at home or pack them up the next time you're in the car, waiting at the dentist's office or sitting in a restaurant. Families and games go together, so get those newspapers and magazines out of the recycle bin and make the connection!
ABC's - Give each child a page from a newspaper or magazine. Assign them an alphabet letter and see how many words they can circle starting with that letter within a minute. Variation: Can you find a word for each letter of the alphabet?
People Match-Ups - Cut out pictures of comic strip characters or famous people from entertainment and sports magazines. Separate the heads and bodies and mix up the pieces. Try to match the correct head with each body. Variation: Glue pictures of people onto popsicle sticks and use for puppet stories.
Mad Libs¨ - One player chooses a paragraph and crosses out random nouns, verbs and adjectives in the story. A second player names new nouns, verbs and adjectives to replace the crossed-out ones. Read the new story--how funny did it turn out?
Puzzle Pictures - Cut out large, colorful magazine pictures and cut them into simple puzzle pieces for your child to put back together.
Pair Them Up - Cut out pairs of items that go together: product names and their logos, comic strip characters and their balloon sayings, photos of people and their names. Shuffle the pieces and see if your child can match them correctly.
Buy It - Cut out pictures along with the prices of grocery and department store items. Place the pictures in a bag. Each child pulls out two or three pictures and adds up the prices within a set time. If he comes up with the correct total, he "keeps" his purchases--if not, they go back in the bag. When the bag is empty see who bought the most correct items. Variations: 1. Use play money and count out the correct change to buy an item. 2. Let your child use the grocery ads to plan a nutritious meal. Add up the prices and quantities and then go shopping!
Graph It - Draw bar graphs of the daily weather or changing stock prices. Make a pie chart showing the percentage of G, PG and PG-13 movies, or teams that won, lost, and tied.
Comic Capers - 1. Cut out comic strips into their individual squares and mix them up. Can you put the strip back together in order to tell the story? 2. White-out the speech balloons and add your own funny sayings.
Picture Stories - Cut out magazine or newspaper pictures and put them in an envelope. Player one pulls out a picture and begins a story using that picture. (For example: "Once upon a time the President visited our town.") Player two chooses another picture and continues, "He decided to watch our school football team win the game." Continue the story until all the pictures are used.
Scavenger Hunt - Have a newspaper scavenger hunt. See who can find the most items in a set period of time: tomorrow's weather, the cheapest airfare to NYC, sports scores, the name of a movie playing at your local cinema. Variation: Give each child a list of objects that can be circled on a magazine picture.
End It - Give your child a short newspaper or magazine story, but cut off the ending. Have her write her own ending and then compare it to the real one. Variations: 1. Give her endings from three different stories; can she choose the correct one? 2. Match headlines with the correct stories.
Bingo - Fill in a bingo card with the names of newspaper sections--comics, sports, travel, world news, local news, coupons, word puzzles, real estate, jobs, etc. Place articles representing those sections in a bag. Pull out one at a time and have your child cross off the matching category square until he fills in a row or the whole card.
Where in the World? - Find articles about countries in the news. Plot their geographic locations on a world map.
Missing Words - Gather 10 classified ads and carefully cut out the word the ad is describing: a "boat" or "house" for sale, a job listing such as "teacher" or "gardener," or an event, "library story time" or "town meeting." Shuffle the words and ads and let your child pair them up again.
Categories - Draw a grid of five by five squares. Down the left side, write five kinds of items to locate in the newspaper, such as politicians, products for sale under $10, foreign countries in the news, sports teams that lost, books, music or movies with good reviews. Can your child fill in all 25 squares with words or pictures? Variation: Write letters across the top and challenge your child to find items that begin with that letter, for example, a foreign country that begins with "T."
Magazine Art - Cut a simple magazine picture in half horizontally or vertically. Glue one half to one side of a sheet of white paper. Have your child draw and color in the missing half. Variation: Give each child part of a picture to copy exactly. Glue the drawings together--how close did they come to the original?
Picture Cards - Glue pictures of cars or store products from newspapers and magazines onto index cards. The next time you're running errands on the road or in stores (or watching TV commercials) your child can look for those items. If he spots one, he keeps the card.
Magazine Charades - Cut out pictures of people that show them in different body positions. One player chooses a picture and forms her body in the same position. Hold up five pictures--can the other players guess which one is the match? Variation: Cut out faces with various facial expressions and let players imitate that emotion.
Newspaper Copies - Press a flattened piece of sticky-tack (used to hang pictures) onto a newspaper article. Peel the sticky-tack back gently to reveal a reverse image. Can your child read the backwards words?
Peephole Pictures - Cut out a one-inch circle anywhere on a sheet of white paper. Lay it on top of a magazine picture. Can your child identify the picture by looking through the hole? For younger children, cut a larger hole or several small holes.
Papier Mache - Mix 1/2 cup flour and 2 cups cold water or use wallpaper paste. Dip newspaper strips into the paste, squeeze off the excess, and drape over a balloon. Apply several layers, allowing each layer to dry before adding the next one. Decorate as desired with paint, glitter, and other craft items. Create an ornament with a small balloon or a pinata with a large one. Cut a hole in the top, fill with treats, and seal the opening.
Newspaper Trees - Try this old favorite by rolling a sheet of newspaper into a narrow cylinder. Tape it closed on one end. At the open end, cut five slits that go halfway down the roll. By pulling and turning gently on the cut end, you'll see the "branches" come out.
Newspaper Science - Place a thin, 12-inch, wood ruler on a table so about four inches are hanging over the edge. Lay several sheets of newspaper over the part of the ruler on the table. Now hit the free end of the ruler with your fist. The ruler should break instead of lifting up the newspaper into the air. Why? Air has weight and is holding the newspaper down so the ruler breaks instead of flying up.
© 2004 Doris Schuchard
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January-February 2004 - Articles and Columns
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