Birthday Card Work

We celebrated the first birthday of the school year in our classroom this week.  As part of the special occasion, I put out birthday card work for the morning.  This was something that was part of my Montessori training as well as something that was used in the school where I interned and taught previously.

Here is the work set up on a little table which I pushed up against the back of a shelf.  You can see that I used a page protector into which I inserted a paper with the name and age of the birthday girl.  I just stuck it onto the shelf with some of that sticky-tack stuff.  The table holds (from left to right) a basket with pieces of folded construction paper in several colors, a little clear box of birthday stickers, an empty basket to hold the paper from the back of the stickers, and a mug of skinny markers.  There is also a red placemat.

Here is a photo which shows the whole activity better.  I modelled the card-making in front of the class at line time.  I showed them how to choose a card, use ONE sticker strip (with 2 stickers) to place stickers on the card, throw the paper in the basket and draw/write on the card.  I pointed out that if they couldn't write their name on the card, they could go to their cubbies and get one of their name labels to place on the card so our birthday girl would know who the card is from.  When they completed the card, they were to take it to the birthday girl wherever she was in the classroom and wish her "Happy Birthday."  Several children chose this work during our work time today.  I think I should put it out more often than just on birthdays, however, because some students wanted to make a card for someone in their family instead of for our birthday child. 

In my training it was suggested that you provide some matboards with a shape cut out (like the ones you put into a picture frame to frame a photo) for the children to use to trace onto the card and to write the message inside.  I didn't, however, have any so I didn't put any out. 

Comments

[Laura]

Thats a great idea for holding the childs name card. Thanks for sharing!
Take care,
Laura

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[christy]

I use the birthday cake balloon holders in pink and blue to hold the child's name. I also have some stamps that can be used in ink that say happy birthday. This is set upon a shelf because I dont have room for a table.

[Lindart]

Nice idea! I've done this with Christmas and Valentines Day, but not birthdays! How do you do your BD celebration?