Have you ever found that your student is pretty close to understanding, but just needs another practice or two beyond what your main curriculum offers? Or you'd like to do a learning activity that just seems less "school-ish"? I love add-in printables for this purpose, and probably have a hundred links saved on Pinterest. Thanks to the crew, we recently discovered Super Teacher Worksheets. Our Individual Membership gave us access to hundreds of worksheets - it's a virtual warehouse of printables for elementary students!
From "A is for Apple" phonics pages to graphing x and y in beginning Algebra, there are extra opportunities for learning in the following areas:
Math (K through 7/early Algebra)
Reading & Writing (including literature studies for many popular early/middle elementary books)
Phonics & Early Literacy
Handwriting (manuscript and cursive)
Grammar
Spellings Lists & Worksheets (Gr. 1-5)
Science (Earth Science and Biology)
Social Studies - history and geography
Holidays (including Pi Day!)
Puzzles & Brain Teasers
Teacher Helpers
There is even the opportunity to make your own worksheets - especially handy for if you are creating your own curriculum and tests.
I found us using a lot of the language arts worksheets. Jude is approximately at a 1st grade level for grammar, so we found a fair bit to work with. We do have a main program that is our language arts spine, but he wasn't totally catching on by the end of the corresponding pages in his workbook. We were able to search out some pages that allowed him a little more practice.
We also used some of the science pages. I haven't found a science program for early elementary students that works for our needs, but the pages gave us some hands-on activities to try. I don't think they will create a full science curriculum, but are good for either very young children who only are in need of basic exposure to science, or mid-elementary students who need some hands-on activities for learning. If you were teaching a large group of students, the science projects' outlines contained clear expectations of what the student should do, and even (for some) how many points each was worth. As much as I loathe school projects (one of the best things about homeschooling is we don't have to spend our weekends doing extra schoolwork!), as a parent I wouldn't mind (or at least, not so much) a project with detailed directions that make it easier to guide my child through the assignment. (There is also a "School Account" option that is pretty economically priced as well.)
Sometimes, we wanted a more laid-back school day. This was a place for Super Teacher Worksheets to really come in handy. There were days where we just didn't want to math and science and reading and...and...and. So we'd print off a stack of worksheets and have a "Worksheet Day. " Some were review - math facts, grammar, etc. - and some were more "fun." One of Jude's favorite activities are word searches, so it was a bit of vocabulary building, theme association, etc. going on, under the guise of "not really a learning day."
The bulk of the worksheets are geared toward early elementary students, from brand new/PK level learners up through about third or fourth grade. This doesn't mean that a slightly older student can't benefit from them, though. Celia's class has been doing a lot of review in school, brushing up on some skills that may have floundered over the summer. She found a number of worksheets that were good review for her. Some that she chose - especially grammar and math facts - were actually geared toward younger students. However, instead of just completing the page, she'd try to race the clock to get her back to being able to autopilot through her times tables.
She's also my kid who likes to do extra schoolwork for fun. Instead of watching TV or playing video games, she likes to do a grammar worksheet.
Not to be left out, Luke asked if there were any higher-level worksheets. I think he was expecting me to say, "Nope, this is a little kid review. " He was pretty surprised after I poked around in the Algebra section and found a graphing coordinates activity!
I guess you're never too old to hang your artwork on the fridge!
The entire library of worksheets is available online, so as long as you have internet access, you can use your account. (You also can print directly from an iPad, so you don't necessarily need a computer.) I appreciate that there are two ways to store files that you've decided to use. The first way is to simply download what you want to use directly to your computer and print it out. This works well for if you just have one student and are happy to browse and print as you go (you can delete the file from your computer when you're done because you can always re-download it again later). The second is an online storage file within your Super Teachers account. Here you can gather activities for access elsewhere (great if you're not always using the same computer to search from that you'd want to download your files to).
It's easy to keep tidy as well - simply remove the worksheet from your filing cabinet when you're done.
Super Teacher Worksheets is a printables powerhouse. With such a wide variety of activities for so many ages, it has quickly become one of my favorites, because I can get early phonics pages for Damien, history for Jude, and refresher math for Celia all from one site. It's also inexpensive - $19.95 for a single teacher membership (school packages start at $250/year and cover every teacher/aide/admin in a building). It probably won't replace all of my favorite printables sources, but it will become one of the first places I check for when I need a little something extra for learning.
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