Tag Archives: activities

Flag Day – June 14

Posted on by
Reply

Flag Day
In memory of the day in 1777 when the Continental Congress adopted the Stars and Stripes as the official flag of the United States, the president proclaims June 14 as Flag Day every year. Americans respond by displaying the flag and holding other patriotic demonstrations.

The most widely known symbol of a nation is its flag – a piece of cloth with a picture or design that represents something special about that nation. In the United States, that flag, of course, is the Stars and Stripes.

Every part of the flag’s design represents an American ideal. The red, white, and blue colors are symbolic of the American spirit – red for hardiness and valor, white for purity and innocence, and blue for perseverance and justice. The 13 red and white stripes stand for the original 13 colonies. And the stars represent the 50 states.

For more than 200 years, the Stars and Stripes has flown over the United States in good times and in bad. Created during the Revolutionary War, the flag has changed as the nation has changed, but the ideals for which it stands have not.

Honoring the Stars and Stripes 

In 1942, Congress adopted the Flag Code – a set of rules governing the use and treatment of the U.S. flag. The code is based on the principle that the flag should be honored and respected as a symbol of the nation it represents. Here are just a few of the rules to give you an idea of how we are to treat our national flag:

Flag Etiquette

The U.S. flag should be displayed every day except when weather conditions might damage it. It is customarily displayed from sunrise to sunset but can be flown 24 hours a day. It should be raised briskly and lowered slowly and ceremoniously.

When flown with a group of flags other than national flags on separate staffs, the U.S. flag must be in the center and higher than the others.

If there are other national flags being displayed, they should be flown on separate staffs of the same height and of the same size as the U.S. flag.

During times of mourning, raise the flag to its peak then lower it to half-mast. Raise it to peak again before lowering it at the end of the day.

When the flag is used to cover a casket, it should be placed with the union at the head and over the left shoulder. It should not be lowered into the grave or allowed to touch the ground.

At no time should the U.S. flag touch the ground, the floor, or anything beneath it.

The flag should never be used for any advertising purpose. It should not be embroidered, printed or otherwise impressed on such articles as cushions, handkerchiefs, napkins, boxes, or anything intended to be discarded after temporary use. Advertising signs should not be attached to the staff or halyard.

The flag should not be used as part of a costume or athletic uniform, except that a flag patch may be used on the uniform of military personnel, fireman, policeman and members of patriotic organizations.

The flag should never have placed on it, or attached to it, any mark, insignia, letter, word, number, figure, or drawing of any kind.

The flag should never be used as a receptacle for receiving, holding, carrying, or delivering anything.

When the flag is lowered, no part of it should touch the ground or any other object; it should be received by waiting hands and arms. To store the flag it should be folded neatly and ceremoniously.

Discarding the flag

When a flag is no longer usable, the most dignified way to destroy it is to burn it. But burning a flag that is still fit for display is considered a sign of political protest. It’s also the subject of much debate. Research the issue of flag-burning. Then write a newspaper opinion piece, editorial, letter to the editor, editorial cartoon, column that summarizes your thoughts about this issue.

Here is a great interactive site for you to check out: americanhistory.si.edu/starspangledbanner/

Information and activities are from KRP’s Ultimate Holiday Activity Guide and Patriotism tab distributed by the NIE Institute.

 

Armed Forces Day 2013

Posted on by
Reply

May 18 is Armed Forces Day. What is it and how did it originate?

President Harry S. Truman led the effort to establish a single holiday for citizens to come together and thank our military members for their patriotic service in support of our country.

On August 31, 1949, Secretary of Defense Louis Johnson announced the creation of an Armed Forces Day to replace separate Army, Navy, Marine Corps and Air Force Days.

The single day celebration stemmed from the unification of the Armed Forces under the Department of Defense.

For more information and to download a FREE poster visit http://www.defense.gov/afd/

ACTIVITIES

Here are some activities you can use with the newspaper from the NIE Institute.

1. Look through the newspaper for mentions of either active military officials or veterans of war. Why are they mentioned? Create a bulletin board or scrapbook with related articles and photographs. You may want to use an entire week’s worth of papers.

2. Do a newspaper scavenger hunt for at least 15 words that could refer to Armed Forces Day (example: war; holiday; military; etc.). When the 15 words are found, write your own short story using at least 10 of the words you’ve chosen. Give your story a military theme.

3. Many military personnel are on active duty. Find an article that deals with one of our current military operations. Work with two or three fellow students to write an article in favor of or against our current military action. Schedule a classroom debate to discuss the pros and cons.

4. Invite local military personnel to visit your classroom. Have students write feature stories about the visitors, discussing their lives to share with other students.

Cinco de Mayo

Posted on by
Reply

Cinco de Mayo is a national holiday in Mexico, but it is also widely celebrated by Mexican-Americans in the United States. The holiday, which in Spanish means the “Fifth of May,” commemorates the Battle of Puebla, when Mexican patriots stopped a French invasion. It often is  confused with Mexico’s Independence Day, which is Sept. 16.
The Battle of Puebla victory was significant in that the smaller, less well-equipped army toppled the bigger, stronger one.

To honor the day, people throughout Mexico, as well as many cities throughout the United States, celebrate with festivals and fiestas, enjoying traditional Mexican food and special music and dances. People often don clothes of red and green — two of the colors of the Mexican flag (along with white).  -McClatchy Newspapers

ACTIVITIES from the KRP Ultimate Holiday Activity Guide

While most Mexican-Americans celebrate the traditional American holidays, many also continue to observe the major holidays of their homeland, such as Cinco de Mayo. Often, they do so with fiestas. Explain to students that fiesta means festival, a colorful celebration that can include fireworks, dancing, the ringing of bells, parades, and plenty of food and drink. Another Mexican tradition, the pinata, is also usually present. Pinatas, which are commonplace in many American celebrations, are usually made of papier-mache and are shaped like animals. Find a papier-mache “recipe” and old newspapers and help your students make a pinata for Cinco de Mayo. Display their work throughout the school.

Discuss other ways Mexican-Americans have had an influence on American society and your community. Ask students to find and clip newspaper stories and photos that illustrate this influence. They can create a bulletin board display in honor of this important Mexican national holiday.

Mexico is an important American neighbor. Things that happen in Mexico often affect the United States and vice versa. Have students look for a news story about an event or happening in Mexico that will have an impact on the United States. Allow them to discuss their conclusions. Then have them look for a U.S. story that might have an effect on Mexico.

What is Arbor Day?

Posted on by
Reply

Glenda E. Fauske the Information and Education Coordinator / ND Forest Service at North Dakota State University in Bottineau, N.D. provided me with some excellent information on Arbor Day.

April 26 is the “national” Arbor Day. North Dakota’s Arbor Day is the first Friday in May. Each state has their own Arbor Day depending upon the planting season in their state. This year, however, ND is celebrating their State Arbor Day on May 17 at Annie’s House in Bottineau, N.D.  Click on the following links to learn more:

A Brief History of Arbor Day

N.D. Arbor Day Celebration

Arbor Days Across the Nation

Newspaper Activities from the NIE guide, A Plan for All Seasons written by Ann West and distributed by the NIE Institute.  

  • Work with a friend, a relative or a parent to clip pictures and names of trees from your newspaper over the period of a couple of weeks.  Clip photos from newspaper stories or advertisements; clip the names of trees, try to draw your own picture of how each tree appears.
  • Create a scrapbook of trees popular or commonly grown in your community.  Paste or tape pictures of different trees on different pages of your scrapbook and identify the type of tree you have selected.  If you clip names of trees, try to draw your own picture of how each tree appears.
  • Finally, try to find an example of a leaf from most of the types of trees you identified in your notebook.  Attach the leaf to the appropriate page.  If you can’t find a particular leaf, do some research and draw a sample leaf from the tree.
  • When you complete your scrapbook, add a page to the back of the scrapbook in which you describe any findings you and your partner made.  Include any final statements about your research and what you learned about trees in your community.

April lesson plans using the newspaper

Posted on by
Reply

Here is a calendar with daily lesson plans using the newspaper for the month of April. The calendar is from the NIE Institute.

To download a printable copy, click on the following link:  April Lesson Plans

Spring Holidays

Posted on by
Reply

From KRP’s The Ultimate Holiday Activity Guide. Here are some holidays that are observed in March and sometimes in April.

The Christian observances of Maundy Thursday, Good Friday and Easter, and the Jewish Passover are important religious holidays that fall in March or April. The Eastern Orthodox Easter, called Pascha, also falls into this time period.

Spring holy days provide many opportunities for you to discuss such concepts as tolerance and respect for each other’s beliefs. Begin a discussion of tolerance by explaining to students that tolerance means to put up with practices and beliefs that are different from your own. Then ask them to find five items in the newspaper: stories, photos and comics that are examples of tolerance or intolerance. Conclude by asking them to describe the effects of the acts of tolerance or intolerance in each example.

Instruct students to find a newspaper photo that shows diversity among a group of people. Ask: What differences do you see between the people pictured? Have students discuss the level of tolerance or intolerance portrayed in the photo.

April Fools’ Day Activities

Posted on by
Reply

Information and activities are from A Plan For All Seasons: Using newspapers in grades 3-8 to make the most of holidays and seasonal events.  Written by Ann West, NIE Consultant and distributed by the NIE Institute.

April Fools’ Day is often celebrated with harmless pranks and foolish happenings.  In real life, many of us feel foolish on occasion about something we may have said or done without thinking.

The pages of the newspaper often contain news of people who have been foolish in some way.  Some people in the news may have not thought before they acted; others may have gotten caught doing something they should not have done, leaving them feeling foolish.

Create an April Fools’ Day Hall of Shame by selecting photos or names of people in the newspaper who have said or done something foolish.  These people may be famous people or they may not be so well known.  You may even want to find comic strip characters who have done or said somthing foolish.

Clip from the newspaper one or two examples of foolish people and mount the names or faces on a sheet of construction paper.  Explain the following items.

1.  WHO the person is

2.  WHAT the person said or did

3.  WHEN this person said or did it

4.  WHY you think this person deserves a place in the Hall of Shame

Art Activities Using the Newspaper

Posted on by
Reply

In celebration of the Art Wise Elementary Art Show March 19-21 in Grand Forks, here are some art activities to use with the newspaper from the NIE Institute.

Download and print the activities by clicking here

Art activities using the Newspaper:

1. Study the figures from the sport’s section. Note the position of a body when playing ball, running or jumping. Draw some of the figures in different positions.

2. Illustrate a news story noting place, persons, events, spectators, etc.

3. Using the expressions of the comic characters draw faces showing emotion; surprise, sad, happy, etc. Find photographs illustrating a variety of expressions.

4. Using cut-outs from ads, create a new ad considering: arousing attention, pleasing balance, pleasing colors and overall effect.

5. Use the comics to:

• Illustrate some of the comic characters.

• Discuss how artists communicate the idea of motion i.e. raised feet, body position, curved motion lines, etc.

• Color black and white comics.

• Analyze emotions; happy, sad, frightened, angry, etc. Discuss how the artists communicate emotion.

• For a study in shapes color all squares in red, rectangles in blue, circles in green, etc.

6. Use a photograph as a still life model.

7. Re-design a house in the classified ads. Enlarge or modify, re-design the outside by adding a patio, porch, second story, etc. Color a picture of a house in different colors to study how color affects appearance. Design the interior as described in the ad.

8. For a discussion of textures have students cut out pictures of things in the paper that have different textures. Paste on poster board or sheet of paper. Next to the picture write one word that describes the texture such as soft, furry, scratchy, smooth, etc.

9. Draw a caricature (a drawing of a person that makes a certain feature stand out) of someone in the news.

10. Create a person’s face by drawing features from a variety of faces; eyes, shape, hair, etc.

11. Find examples of different font styles in the paper. Select one style you like and try writing your name in this style.

12. Using animal photos in the newspaper, create an animal scene such as a zoo, circus, farmyard, jungle, etc.

13. Illustrate a newspaper ad that has no picture with it.

14. Younger students can make an alphabet book using headline and advertising letters. Use newspaper pictures to illustrate each letter.

15. Cut out a picture of a person in a sport’s scene. Have students draw a crowd watching the event and of other players in different positions surrounding the player.

16. Draw a comic strip based on a news story.

17. Create newspaper scrapbooks for a variety of themes; transportation, holidays, landscapes, buildings, plants, etc.

18. Collect and study photographs with regard to perspective, proportion, balance, shading, use of color, etc.

19. Watch the newspaper for stories of art related articles; art sales, shows and exhibits, art form, etc.

20. For a study of architecture have students design house plans based on descriptions of houses listed in the real estate ads.

21. Make a silhouette using the classified section as the paper for the head. Have students cut out words from the paper that describe them. Cut out the silhouette and paste it on a piece of construction paper with the describing words pasted around the head.

22. Illustrate a letter to the editor as a political cartoon.

23. Draw a map of the places mentioned in the front page news.

St. Patrick’s Day Newspaper Activities

Posted on by
Reply

In Ireland and Northern Ireland, St. Patrick’s Day is a religious holiday in honor of the patron saint of Ireland. But in the United States, it is primarily a secular, or non-religious, holiday in which people don green attire and lucky shamrocks in celebration of Irish heritage. Parades are also a big part of St. Patrick’s Day in more than 100 U.S. cities.

Here are some activities from KRP’s Ultimate Holiday Activity Guide.

1. The shamrock a plant with three leaflets is a national symbol in Ireland. Find information on the shamrock, then, in the days leading up to St. Patrick’s Day, collect shamrocks found in newspaper ads.

2. Pretend you are going on a trip to Ireland to celebrate St. Patrick’s Day. First, do research on Ireland to find out what the weather is like and which places you would like to visit. Then pack your bags using items found in the newspaper ads.

St. Patrick’s Day Newspaper Scavenger Hunt 

Find as many of these items as you can in the newspaper:

1. An advertisement for an item that would take a “pot of gold” to buy.

2. A recipe for preparing corned beef and cabbage.

3. A feature story about lucky people or events.

4. A city that might be able to see a rainbow due to their weather.

5. A list of all the different shades of green named in the paper.

6. Four lucky things you wish for, that you could write on each leaf of a four leaf clover.

7. Somewhere hosting a St. Patrick’s Day parade, party or dance.

8. Something Irish.

9. A photo of someone celebrating St. Patrick’s Day.

10. A story about someone who is helping others, like St. Patrick helped his fellow Irishmen.

11. Find a classified help wanted listed that would be a good job for a leprechaun.

12. A list of Irish names found in the obituary listings.

13. The name of a sport’s team whose colors are green & white.

14. A comic strip about St. Patrick’s Day.

The Saint Patrick’s Day Newspaper Scavenger Hunnt was provided by Diane Goold, Newspaper In Education Director, St. Joseph News-Press, St. Joseph, MO and Dale Miller (Essex County Newspaper)