Holiday Door Decorating

'Tis the season for holiday door decorating and the staff at Erie High School once again produced some amazing doors! The theme this year was either holiday books or holiday movies/TV shows. Can you guess all the themes? The answers are below the picture (or at the end of the series of pictures).

THEME:

That was my husband's door and the theme was pretty evident (The Polar Express). And, yes, he did let me help and he did actually do quite a bit of the work. 😉 

THEME:

A Christmas Story theme from our choir & driver's ed teachers. 🎅

THEME:

Die Hard from one of our math teachers. Thankfully, they cut short one of the quotes. 😆

THEME:

Elf on a Shelf (female & male elves) by one of our English and one of our social studies teachers. 

THEME:

Frosty the Snowman by one of our English teachers. 

THEME:

National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation by the guidance office. That cat! 😂🙀🎄

THEME:

Elf by one of our science teachers. This movie is the best and she captured it perfectly! The display is filled with the best quotes from the movie, too.

THEME:

Gremlins by one of our English teachers. Check out Gizmo in the microwave. 😳😂 

The artistic skills are amazing here! 

THEME:

The Grinch by one of our math teachers. I really love that the ornaments were made by the students in her class! 

THEME:

Miracle on 34th Street by the P.E. department.

THEME:

The Nightmare Before Christmas (in this case, "Avoid the Nightmare Before Finals") from our office staff and principal. Is this perfect, or what!? I love their advice to students!

THEME:

A Christmas Carol from our librarian.

THEME:

Festivus (from Seinfeld) by our Spanish teacher. This one made me laugh. I love Festivus! 😂

THEME:

Snowmen at Work by our special ed. department. The details on the snowmen are amazing! ⛄

THEME:

Home Alone from our RtI teacher. 😱

THEME:

The Year Without Santa Claus from the family and consumer science teacher (who has two doors into her room). They also decorated the hallway with these cute figures! 👏

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Aren't these doors terrific? I love this tradition and am so thankful that I can still participate, albeit in a roundabout way (thanks to my husband!).

Does your school have a door decorating contest or do you decorate for the holidays? Comment and share below!

Literature Inspired Ornaments

I had a classroom set of very old, falling apart To Kill a Mockingbird books. They were in too poor of condition to resell or donate (many were missing pages). Some of the pages we used for a blackout poetry project. But with 100+ of these books, I wanted to find another easy way to repurpose my favorite novel. 

BOOK QUOTE ORNAMENT (Glued on outside of ball)
I was inspired by images on Pinterest of so many book crafts; one that caught my eye that I knew I would be capable of making was an image of a holiday ornament made from pages of a book. I gathered up some old plastic colored balls and grabbed my Modge Podge glue and scissors and started cutting and gluing.

I quickly realized that my strips were too wide. If you are gluing the pages on the outside of the ball, cut the strips into two- or three-line strips. The skinnier the quotes, the easier they are to wrap around the ball. I found wrapping them vertically rather than horizontally worked best. 

But this way does take a long time. I also found out NOT to glue your favorite quotes first, because chances are, they will be covered up. The first layer of quotes will probably not show, so feel free to glue blank pages first, then your favorite quotes after.

It took me several hours just to complete one. The more I made, though, the faster I became. Picking out the quotes probably took the longest.

They were pretty but needed a little sparkle. I purchased some Diamond Dust, clear glitter, and clear "vase filler" baubles that looked like little ice pebbles and figured I would experiment with each and see what I liked best.

Make sure to let the ornaments dry completely overnight or for at least 12 hours before adding any embellishments.

I found my favorite look was to glue the ice pebbles near the top, then sprinkle the diamond dust on top and down the sides. I didn't want too much because I wanted to be able to read the quotes through the dust and glitter. 

You can experiment with the amount of bling you wish to add. 

BOOK QUOTE ORNAMENT (Filled clear balls or other shapes)
I really love the look of the glued strips on the balls, but not the amount of time they took. So I purchased some clear balls and present shapes and decided to fill them instead. (This ornament is FAST and so easy!)

I took the quotes and wrapped them around my pinky, then stuck them in the balls. Most of them retained their shapes. I experimented with wrapping them around skinnier objects like a colored pencil or just rolling them into a spiral helped keep their curls better.  

While just the book quotes looked nice, they tended to just roll up together into one big curl. So I realized I needed another element inside the shapes to keep them from doing that.

I added a mixture of the diamond dust, clear glitter, silver glitter, and some of the little ice pebbles. This worked well. Adding another paper element that wasn't rolled into a curl, however, worked the best. I had some crinkles--I don't know what you call these things, but they are like shredded paper folded in zig zags--left over from a gift, so I added some of those, and they worked. They kept the quote strips apart and added some color, too.

There are so many possibilities you can try with this type of ornament. As long as it fits in the ball, you could add charms, beads, and anything that fits inside relating to the novel.

I hope you enjoy this little craft and are able to repurpose your own old novel sets into beautiful ornaments.

Feel free to ask me any questions in the comments.  

Using Holiday Ads in the Classroom

During the holidays, advertisers ramp up their advertising, luring buyers to their stores. They'll use colorful, vivid words to snag new customers, which actually works in YOUR favor, English teachers! You can use their ads to teach a number of lessons.

1. CHANCE (or DADA) POEMS: Cut up the words and use them for an impromptu poetry writing session. I like to store the words in little plastic baggies and use them when we have time left at the end of the period. I'll have students work in groups and prompt them to create a poem based on the lesson we just practiced (or the book/story/character we are reading). Or if there is a fun event coming up (a holiday, a dance, etc.), have them create a poem related to the event. Give them a limited time to create a poem, then have each group share with the class.

2. PARTS OF SPEECH REVIEW: Have students cut out the words themselves*, only with a twist--require students to find an example of each part of speech (noun, pronoun, verb, adjective, adverb, preposition, conjunction, and interjection). You can make it a contest and see who can come up with the most (and the most interesting). *If the words are already cut out, they can just each take a baggie full and sort them by part of speech.

3. REVIEW IDIOMS AND CLICHÉS: Ads are perfect for containing overused idioms and clichés. Introduce and/or review the figurative phrases with your students. Have them find their own in the ads, old magazines, or in newspaper headlines.

4. ANALYZE THE MERIT OF MARKETING: Have students look over the ads, analyzing the marketing techniques used, including the word choices and design/aesthetics (colors, font, and placement of words and products on the page). Which phrases stood out to them? Which did they pay little attention to? Were others more effective? Why?

5. ANALYZE TARGET AUDIENCES: As students look over the ads, ask them to evaluate who might the target audience be for the ad. How did they come to that conclusion? Which words and/or phrases did they use as clues? Do the ads stereotype?

I've been using ads and newspapers in my classroom for years. If you do not have access to a newspaper or magazines, check with your media specialist to see if she/he has older copies that can be saved for you. Also, your school may be eligible for Newspapers in Education. It's a wonderful program that supplies classrooms with copies of newspapers, which are paid for by donations from local businesses.

My Magnetic Poetry Kit is also an option for activities #1 and #2 if you don't have access to newspapers or magazines.

You can keep collecting the ads through the spring: Valentine's Day ads are perfect for love-inspired poems; there's also President's Day, St. Patrick's Day, Easter, and so on... Each holiday will offer different flavors of language to suit the occasion.

COMING SOON: Handouts for each of these activities, which will be included in my POETRY BUNDLE (a bundle of ALL of my poetry-related resources...past, present, and future!)