Blog - Your Thrifty Co-Teacher

Making an Escape Room

Have you ever considered creating an escape room that covers the skills or standards you have taught, but you didn't know where to start? These engaging scenario games make reviewing skills fun for students, but they seem so complex to create. The good news is that they do not have to be. I recently created a simplified version for my upper elementary students, and they absolutely loved it. In ... Read More about Making an Escape Room

Fun Subject and Predicate Activities

Using engaging subject and predicate activities can not only make the lessons fun, but they will help the students master these terms and understand what makes up a complete sentence. Subjects and predicates can be a complex concept for students to understand. Throw in the terms complete subject, complete predicate, simple subjects and simple predicates, and it's even more complex. Here are ... Read More about Fun Subject and Predicate Activities

Fun Activities for Teaching Prepositions & Prepositional Phrases

Teaching prepositions and prepositional phrases is one of the most engaging grammar skills to teach. There are so many fun prepositional phrase activities and resources available. From books to videos to tossing paper airplanes across the room, these activities are sure to create some memories while helping your students master the use of prepositions. When Teaching Prepositions, ... Read More about Fun Activities for Teaching Prepositions & Prepositional Phrases

Tips for Teaching Types of Sentences

Identifying and learning the terms for the different types of sentences sure can be tricky. The terms go from command, question, exclamation, and statement to imperative, interrogative, exclamatory, and declarative. Here are some tips for teaching types of sentences to upper elementary students. Types of Sentences First, let's go over the types of sentences and some tricks to teach the students ... Read More about Tips for Teaching Types of Sentences

Fun Ordering Adjectives Activities for Upper Elementary

Which adjective goes first? Did that sound right? These are just some of the questions that arise when ordering adjectives in English. Although it can be tricky, there are some fun and engaging activities we can provide our students with that will help them master the order of adjectives. (This blog contains Amazon Affiliate links, which means that Amazon throws a few pennies my way if you ... Read More about Fun Ordering Adjectives Activities for Upper Elementary

Parts of Speech Anchor Charts and Activities

Reviewing parts of speech with students at the start of the school year can save teachers a lot of frustration later on. This is most apparent in upper elementary classrooms where students will be diving deeper into different categories of nouns, pronouns, verbs, adjectives (such as comparative and superlative adjectives) and more. Taking the time to go over these parts of speech does not have to ... Read More about Parts of Speech Anchor Charts and Activities