First Week Elementary Activities?

Hey guys,

I'm in deep shit this week as I will be starting my classes for the new Semester. The thing is, the books are not yet given to the students so I am with no other choice but to find myself any activities for my Elem. kids from Grades 1-6.

I'm out of my wits as of the moment so if somebody out there who can lead me on to a nice website/s or any good good ideas for activites as a headstart for the opening of classes, they'd be much much appreciated.

 Thanks alot!

For the lower levels,

For the lower levels, repetition is always good.  When I taught at schools, I would always start the day with the same set of drills.  Such as 'What day is today?  What day is tomorrow?  What day was yesterday?'  'What is the date?'  'How's the weather?  Is it sunny?  Is it raining?'  Pick out a few of the higher level kids, and ask them questions...'How are you today?  What did you do today?  What did you eat for lunch?'  Then move on to lower level kids now that they have an understanding of what's going on.  Manage your time wisely and you should be able to get 10-15 mins out of doing these sort of questions and drills. 

Then take a set of vocabulary words that fits the respective class' level.  You should be able to do all sorts of stuff with vocab if you brainstorm a little.  One vocabulary exercise I used to do with lower level was somewhat like a memory game.  It'd be like the game in which cards are turned over in order to find two matching pictures.  Instead, you're using the vocabulary words.  Let's say you have ten vocab words, draw twenty squares representing cards, and number them one through twenty.  On a piece of paper, you'll have the correct matches in your hand, obviously you wouldn't share this with the class.  You'll call on a student to choose two numbers.  For example, David chooses 3 and 7.  You tell them out loud what the words that represent 3 and 7 are.  Every match earns a point.  No pencils or papers so they can use their ears to listen and remember where the matching words are.  When all the matches are revealed, the game is over.

Another one is, just at random, in scattered fashion, write 10-20 words on the board...just all over the place.  Have the kids take out a piece of paper and a pencil.  What you'll do is randomly choose words and describe the meaning, act out, use an example sentence but say 'Blank' where the word would fit.  For example, "Number one.  I use these to cut paper."  And the kids would write 1. Scissors, and continue until done.  I used this for higher levels, even middle school, for vocabulary practice.  Highest scores would get a prize. 

One more...write a group of words on the board.  For example,

R T A B O P S M

The objective is for kids to come up with as many words as possible using these letters.  You can do this by having volunteers come up and write a word and rewarding them.  For example, SMART. 

I'm not saying these are great ideas but just examples of things I would do that would take up time, be productive and easy to do with a little prep work.  Hmmm..I kind of miss teaching now.  Ahh...the good ole days.

So you were hired as a

So you were hired as a teacher, but without the book you have no idea what to do? Not only that but you can't even think to type "first day activities" into google to do a basic search. I feel sorry for your students.

Wow! These ideas are great

Wow! These ideas are great and will surely be in handy! I am teaching Elementary  kids as well.

In my years of teaching, there were  times where my mind went blank due to stress or pressure from other aspects.  Even if you got alot of ideas in mind, it just won't seem to work at times. That is fully understandable.

Anyway, why don't you try eslcafe.com and go to "stuff for teachers" and click: idea cookbook.. it will lead you to different topics or activities that will suit your class/es.