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Bulletin Boards



Back to School


Back to School with Idioms - Mark & Shelli Temple
This is a little bulletin board that I have picked up along the way. The idea behind it is to give students a positive outlook to go into the new school year with. This could also be used for coming back from winter break and starting the new calendar year. To the right are downloadable versions of what the bulletin board looks like put together, and its central element. The second is sized for printing on a 8.5 x 11 inch sheet for use with an overhead projector.



Collages for the first day... - Shelli Temple
This BB is a great first week or get to know you activity. Have pre-cut profile silhouettes available for the kids to use. Give each student a silhouette and have them glue on pictures from magazines that tell about who they are. Then hang on the board for a colorful and dramatic bulletin board.


Schedule Slips Daily Display - Colleen Gallagher
Get ready for your back to school schedule display! These are strips for stubjects throughout your day. Download the slips (it may take awhile). Print these out on cardstock and then laminate. You can use them in a pocket chart or you could use glue a magnet on the back and place them on the white board. This will make your job easier every am. No need to write the schedule just add slips. The slips include graphics to support the words!

We're heading into ____ Grade! - Shelli Temple
I saw this bulletin board and just thought it was adorable! Prior to the beginning of school, ask your parents to send you a snapshort of their child. The bulletin board itself is a giant school bus on the road to school. In each window, have a child's picture. In the driver's seat, include your own picture. A cute way to start the year!


End of the Year


_____ Grade Was a Ball! - Colleen Gallagher
Cover a bulletin board with a "beachy" background. Include a sun, water, and sand. Bounce around a beach ball one day in class and discuss what a "ball" the year has been. As you pass the ball to a each student have them discuss what they liked best about the year. Then cut out large circles for everyone in your class. Have the students color the white balls to resemble a beach ball. After they have colored their ball, have them place a piece of white lined paper in the center of the ball. Have the students write about their favorite experience in grade ____. Then place the balls onto the beach scene.

Caps and Tassels... - Shelli Temple
Using black posterboard, cut out 9" squares, one for each graduate. Mount these on the bulletin board where they are tilted onto one corner like a diamond. Using white chalk, write each graduate's name along the upper left hand side. Use yarn in your school colors to create the tassels. Allow each graduate to take home his or her "hat" when you are tearing down for the summer.

High Fives For Summer! - Colleen Gallagher
Have the students trace their hand onto a piece of construction paper (their choice of color). Then, have them cut out their hands. Give each student a white piece of lined paper and direct them to glue part of the piece onto the palm of the hand they just cut. Now the students can write their summer plans on their palm. Add a plain colored background, a border of your choice, and the title; "High Fives For Summer."

Sailing off to the ___ Grade - Shelli Temple
Make sailboats with each child's name on the boat. Allow students to decorate sails or write 3 things they've learned this year, etc. Then have them find their name and attach the sail to the boat.

You Will Be My Summer Sunshine - Colleen Gallagher
Take a picture of each of your students and get the picture developed. Then supply your kiddos with a six inch brown circle and several yellow triangular shaped pieces of construction paper. Have the students create sunflowers by gluing the shapes around the circle. Then, have the students create a long stem and a leaf to attach to their sunflowers. Finally, have them place their picture in the center of the flower. Glue their flowers to a bulletin board labeled, "You Will Be My Summer Sunshine."


General


10 Keys to Learning - TT Staff
Use a key pattern to create ten colorful keys, each with one of the following sayings: 1)Know what the problem is asking; 2)Organize your thoughts; 3)Allow enough time to get things done; 4)Ask for help if you don't understand; 5)Set goals; 6)Do your own work; 7)Take time to do things right; 8)Use reference materials such as the dictionary and the internet; 9)Be an active listener; and 10)Reward yourself when your goals are acheived. Post the keys on the board or the chalkboard topper.


Creative Writing Board - Shelli Temple
Using diecuts and brads, you can construct this easy bulletin board for do now activities, a learning center, etc. Make several diecuts of whatever object you choose to use, for example, apples. Use brads to attach two apples together at the top for posting on the board. The top apple is the cover which can be decorated or numbered. The bottom apple has a creative writing prompt, brain teaser, review question, etc on it. This would be a great activity center for when kids are done with their work.

Footprints... - Mark & Shelli Temple
No this isn't the renowned devotional hanging, or anything really similar. Footprints is a bulletin board that traces the ancestry of the development of a certain subject matter. Each footprint marks a significant step in that field of study, be it Benjamin Franklin discovering Electricity or Albert Einstein's Theory of Relativity. This can be adapted to any subject matter. To the right are two kinds of footprints(footprints and shoeprints) sized for printing on a sheet of 8.5 x 11 paper, and an example picture of one possible configuration of the bulletin board.




In the News... - Shelli Temple
This idea works very well for secondary students. In your community paper, watch for articles containing the names of your students. Cut them out and post on colorful paper. Highlight the kid's name and watch that become the most popular board in the room!

Materials Storage Board - Shelli Temple
If you constantly use manipulatives for learning centers, use this for easy materials management. Hang a pegboard in your room where the kids can reach it and hang all manipulatives needed from it. Use baggies for smaller objects and also for ease of viewing. Just poke a hole through the baggie for the hanger, hang on the pegboard for instant storage.

Name that Person - Shelli Temple
Post pictures of important people in your subject area with a short description of the person. Have students try to identify each person for a great extra credit opportunity

Random Acts of Kindness - Janet Hill
This idea would help encourage random acts of kindness and establish a rapport with ones peers. First, Make a background. I would use a light colored paper and have the students glue hand prints on the paper. I use the ellison cutter and make a lot of cuts of hands. In the middle I put, "Random Acts of Kindness". For the boarder I would use either stars or boarder it with the hands. Whenever I see a random act of kindness I take a polaroid picture of the student put the student's name on it and put it on the board. If I see the same student doing an act of kindness I let them put a sticker star on the edge of the picture. At the end of each week the student with the most stars gets a certificate and a free trip to the treasure box. Another variation to the decor of the board it let the students use paint and put their handprints on the background. I think this would be a good motivator for students to learn to show kindness and to get along with one another.

Read all about it!!! - Shelli Temple
Have students gather informative articles about a particular subject, write a summary, then post both the article and the summary on your board. This would be great for election coverage, science news, geography, etc.

Student Made Calendar - Shelli Temple
Instead of using the die cut machine or the premade numbers, cut squares out of posterboard, number them, and have your class decorate each square with student made art. You could do this as a beginning of the year project, or once a month, denoting on the back of the square if it is a holiday or a special event to help funnel the child's creativity.


Holidays


I'm Thankful for... - Shelli Temple
On your bulletin board, have a huge, colorful turkey. Also have a pocket of smaller turkeys (or Thanksgiving related shapes) with the phrase "I'm Thankful for..." printed on them. Have students fill these out as they wish and post them on the board. If you run out of stuff, continue hanging them around the room.

Kicking Off the New Year! - Shelli Temple
This would be an adorable resolutions board due to all of the football games on New Year's Day. The background of the board is a football field with a goal post. Have little footballs available for kids to write their resoultions and post on the board.

New Year's Resolutions - Shelli Temple
Decorate your board with some famous New Year's Resolutions (found in most January magazines of the stars). Have a pocket on the BB with January clip art such as snowflakes, etc, or use the mini notepads you can buy at most teacher supply stores. Have the kids add their resolutions to the board. This could also be used as a sponge activity.


Interactive


Boggle Board - Shelli Temple
A take off on the old game, Boggle, this would be a good board for vocabulary enrichment, extra credit, or a morning activity. On the board, create a grid of your choice, typically a 4x4 or 5x5. In each square, attach a smaller square with a letter printed on it. Encourage kids to find as many words as possible by moving from one letter to another that it touches. A square may only be used once per word. Change out the letter squares often to keep this board exciting.

Calendar Math - Shelli Temple
For a calendar themed learning center, post a teacher made calendar on a bulletin board. Use monthly cutouts for the numbers. The objective is to match math problems to the calendar numbers. Ex: For the December calendar, use trees for the calendar numbers and stars for the problems. Cut a slit in the star so it will fit over the tree top for matching purposes.

Sequencing - Janet Hill
Here is a really cute idea for a bulletin board. Make a background and border of any color or theme. For example, if one is doing a Christmas theme, one may want to do a bulletin board sequencing with Christmas scenes or sentences. One could use sentence strips and make up a sequencing story and mix it up on the bulletin board. Have the students during center time use the board and work out the story. The students will move the sentence strips in the correct order. Have a pocket marked answer sheet. This will let the students know if the story is correct. Have another pocket for sequencing pictures. Make up about 5 of these to have in a zip lock baggy for the students to sequence. This bulletin board can be a lot of fun and one can easily make sequencing pictures. I use comic strips. I hope everyone has fun with this one.

Weather Mascot - Shelli Temple
As part of your calendar/weather board, have a class mascot (bear, dog, etc) mounted with various clothing around him. Have students select the most appropriate clothing for the weather and "dress" the mascot. Examples of clothing: shorts, t-shirt, sandals, raincoat, hat, books, mittens, socks, pants, etc. Attached are black/white and color templates. The main bear pattern has been left loose for viewing, but the rest of the templates are bundles in ZIP Archives. You will need PKUnZip/Winzip or a comparible unarchiver.





Word Search Board - Janet Hill
This bulletin board idea can be done for many themes. Get a border(anything would work. Then put the words to the theme on the bulletin board. Make a poster board size of a word search and laminate it. Then put the poster in the middle of the bulletin board. Also make a word bank. The background,color, and decoration can be whatever theme one is doing at the time. This would be an interactive board. One could put a pocket with a photocopy of the word search. Another way would be to attach a marker to the bulletin board and some tissue and something to wipe the marks off. This way the students can work on the word search on the bulletin board. The teacher can use this during center time and have thematic things there with the bulletin board for the students to rotate to during center time.


Language Arts


Creative Writing - Shelli Temple
This is one of those boards that can be updated easily for a monthly theme. For example, in December, have a large Christmas tree on the board with lots of presents below. Each present has a creative writing prompt on the back. Students can pick a random present for an assignment, make-up work, extra credit, etc. The student then writes the paper or essay, tapes the present to his/her paper, and turns it in. Topics will need to be updated frequently. Other monthly examples: Sept: Tree/Apples; Oct: Haunted House/Ghosts; May: Basket/Flowers. Check out the following site for ideas for creative writing prompts: http://www.angelfire.com/ks/teachme/prompts.html

Making Connections Posters - Colleen Gallagher
These posters were created for my classroom after I read the two books Strategies That Work and Mosaic of Thought. These two books discuss how important it is for us to teach kids how to comprehend and how to think while they read. The posters are visuals to remind the students of the kind of connections they may make while they read. Text to Text, Text to Self, and/or Text to World. Print them and have them laminated for display!





Synthesizing Poster - Colleen Gallagher
Synthesizing is an important strategy that good readers use to understand the text they read. This poster reminds the reader what synthesizing is.


The Town of NYMSVILLE - Colleen Gallagher
Cover a b-board with green paper and place the heading Nymsville at the top. Make three intersecting roads. It should look like a little neighborhood block. Now write one of the following over each of the roads; Homonym Road, Antonym Lane, and Synonym Drive. Give each student three of the attached houses and ask them to decorate them and write a pair of synonyms on one, a pair of antonyms on one, and a pair of homonyms on the other. After they finish their houses allow them to place the house on the correct road. This is a fun review or intro. and it is a nice reference for children to look at.



Mathematics


Geometric Art - Shelli Temple
At some point during the year, usually during testing week, I have my classes do fun art/math projects such as geometric art. This can take many turns. Kids can use a compass to design circle creations, they may use a straightedge (ruler) for op art, or they may design a tesselation. These are alot of fun to display and even can be put onto a t-shirt for wearable math.

Integer Names - Shelli Temple
One of the difficulties facing most pre-algebra students is adding integers, so use this BB for help. Post a huge number line across the BB with A being a -13 up to Z, being at +12. Then have kids locate the letters of their names and find out the value of their name. Post each person's name and value. You could also have math challenges in which you had 5 words and the kids must find out their values for a sponge activity.




Mathematics in Sports - Shelli Temple
To show real life applications of math, have a newsworthy board full of sports stories and stats. Examples: Baseball stats, Football yardage, Odds on a game, etc.


Science


Science Zone - Candis "Candy" Allen
I have had students promise to not miss another day of school if they could have this bulletin board! Make a dark blue background with what ever you have available. Purchase star and planet stickers which shimmer. I found some that were irridescent at Hobby Lobby. Place the stickers randomly on the board as if you were looking into outer space. Using the same type of irridescent lettering and wavey border, put the following instruction...."Please do not adjust your set...you have entered the Science Zone"....


Seasonal


Falling into Poetry - Shelli Temple
This is a great idea for nature poetry. Mount a large tree in the center of your board, complete with empty branches. Give kids construction paper leaves in orange, brown, yellow, and red to write their poems on. Attach some of the leaves onto the branches, some falling to the ground, and some on the ground. You can add blank leaves as needed for ground cover, etc

Spring Time at >>>>>>>>>>*School Name* - Shannon
OK.. this one is going to take a LOT of fun work for the Kids :) *Cut a Spring basket Shape out of Butcher paper. *Get a mixture of starch and water (or just starch) and some tissue paper. (different colors) *Paint the bakset with the starch and place the tissue paper on it... pull it off and the color is left behind. *staple it to the board *make Coffee Filter Flowers *food coloring.. Coffee Filters.. pipe cleaners...* Put the food coloring ont he filters in drops.. let it dry.. make flowers with the pipe cleaners..... *Make Egg Carton Catapillars....... Take 1 side of an egg carton.. paint it with different colors of Tempra paint... let dry and add eyes,nose, mouth.. and Pipe cleaner anteanna......Then decorate as desired.. Add them to the board crawling around the bottom... *Coffee Filter Butterflies... Same process as the Flowers.. only make them like butterflies instead of flowers. Put this all together with the sun.. and clouds.. makes a very cute Spring Time scene. :) Any questins just E me ;) Shannon


Social Studies


Freedom of Speech - Ann Price
This term I am teaching a class in Law and at present we are looking at the First Amendment and Freedom of Speech. The bulletin board for this class shows examples of different kinds of speech. There are 6 areas where speech can be limited: Obscenity, Commercial Speech, Defamation, Fighting Words(hostile audiences), Symbolic Speech, and Time, Place and Manner restrictions. My bulletin board shows an example of each of these: Symbolic Speech is a picture of the two African American athletes in the Mexico City Olympics giving the raised clenched fist Black Panther salute during the national Anthem. Commercial Speech are advertisements. For Obscenity I used a picture of an Adult Bookstore. For Fighting Words I used a picture from the Chicago riots after the death of Martin Luther King JR. For Time, Place, and Manner I used a picture of a teenager speaking at graduation. The hardest one in this to come up with was defamation but for that I used The Enquirer. Each picture has a caption, one or two paragraphs that explain its significance. Also I use a one page explanation of the whole display. This is done on color photo paper, but just a contrasting background to type color.

Frontier Myth - Ann Price
I used photos and paintings. Photos of Billy the Kid, Tombstone, Wild Bill Hicock, reproductions of Wild West Show Bills, etc. Then on the other side the "real" cowboy, black and Hispanic men and women. Each picture has a caption, one or two paragraphs that explain its significance. Also I use a one page explanation of the whole display. This is done on color photo paper, but just a contrasting background to type color.

Immigration - Ann Price
I used pictures from Ellis Island and San Francisco. With this one I included graphs of different racial groups so the kids can see how racial preferences has been a long standing practice. Each picture has a caption, one or two paragraphs that explain its significance. Also I use a one page explanation of the whole display. This is done on color photo paper, but just a contrasting background to type color.

Inventions - Ann Price
For the Industrial Revolution: Drawings of the Spinning Jenny, the first Steam Engine, some of the first telephone photos, etc. Each picture has a caption, one or two paragraphs that explain its significance. Also I use a one page explanation of the whole display. This is done on color photo paper, but just a contrasting background to type color.

Pennants for the States - Shelli Temple
Assign each student (or group) 1 or 2 states. Have kids research the state using their library skills and create an informational banner or pennant for the state. They may wish to include state info such as the state flower, symbol, or important people. Hang around the room for a great geography display

Postcards from Around the World (or US) - Bob Ehrle
Put up an US, world or state map and send out postcards to schools in different areas asking them to send a postcard back to you. As the cards come in, place pins in the map to show location and post the cards around the board.

Westward Movement - Ann Price
Pictures and drawings from that period. A Conestoga Wagon with the family around it. Sod houses from Kansas. Gravestones along the Oregon Trail. Each picture has a caption, one or two paragraphs that explain its significance. Also I use a one page explanation of the whole display. This is done on color photo paper, but just a contrasting background to type color.



A+ Classroom Pictures of Rooms Around The World
Many teachers across the country are willing to share their classrooms with you. You might find an idea or two from these creative teachers. Click on the link to be taken to various classrooms. Also send in your classroom pics. to be on the site!

Bulletin Board Ideas and Tips for the K-3 Teacher
On this bulletin board site you will find an organized list of some of the best K-3 teacher creations on the Internet. The site lists bulletin boards of all kinds; holidays, back to school, monthly, math, reading...

Bulletin Board ideas from GigglePotz
Some adorable BB's here, complete with full color pictures. Some topics include: Character Ed, Christian, Animals, Holidays, etc.

Bulletin Boards for the Music Classroom
A great comprehensive site for music teachers fretting over their classroom decor. A must-see!

Bulletin Boards from Teacher's Corner
Ideas for all ages, seasons, themes, and subjects. Also includes ideas for BB materials.

Food and Nutrition Bulletin Boards
Cute site with several pages of BB all about food and nutrition. Includes directions for making the BB as well as several learning activities to go with each one.

Ideas for Bulletin Boards
A great resource for ideas for bulletin board backgrounds, borders, and subjects.

Kathy Shrock's Guide for Educators - Bulletin Boards
This site has several good bulletin board suggestions, however, not many ideas for the upper grades. Check back often for new material.

More Bulletin Board Ideas
A site with several bulletin board ideas, pictures, and tips. A little slow to load on some pages due to the pictures.

More ideas for the Music classroom
Some more great ideas for displays in the music classroom.

Preschool Bulletin Boards
Brought to you by the contributors at Perpetual Preschool, this site is a sure hit with pre-k teachers.

TeachNet's collection of BB ideas
A great listing of BB ideas brought to you by TeachNet.com