By Sara Finegan

Now that I’ve got the standards identified and turned into tamed beasts, I turn my attention to the resources I’m going to need to teach them.  This is where I become a sleuth, poring through books and magazines and the internet to find materials to use in the classroom.  The following are some of the places I’ve used to build a bank of resources for use in my classroom and to support IEP students in the general education environment as well.

•  English Language Learner resources in your district

Most districts don’t have a ton of lower-level reading materials that can be used in  conjunction with grade-level science and social studies units.  Some, however, have materials for English Language Learners, and those should be grabbed by you whenever possible and used as a part of your instruction.  Second Language learning materials use simplified text and have more visual resources than the general ed texts we have in our classrooms.  If your district has them, find them and get at least one set.

• Visit the book room for primary grade materials

Most schools have a book room or closet containing books that teachers can use at a variety of levels.  One of my schools had a small walk-in closet with shelves full of baskets of leveled books as well as books by topics.    Another one had an entire room with bagged sets of books at each level.  Some were to be used for Extended Day Reading or Intersession classes, but all were available to any teacher who wanted to go through them.

I started at the lowest level and moved my way up, pulling books at every level that were related to anything I was teaching or that my general ed colleagues would be teaching.  I was initially surprised at how much was available from the primer level on up about things like rocks, magnets, landforms, stars and planets, plants, the food chain, and habitats.  I was even more surprised to find books about famous people at even the lowest grade level.

The unit bins that I’ve left for my third, fourth and fifth grade gen ed colleagues to use next year with their inclusion students have books for kids at every reading level.

• Discarded materials

When I first started teaching at the school I am now leaving, my principal didn’t give me the current texts for social studies, language arts, or science.  What she did do was introduce me to the book room at our school, where we had, for many years, an enormous library of discarded textbooks at every grade level.  I was encouraged to take whatever I wanted, and I did.

Discarded text?  you may ask. How exactly does an older version of the fourth grade social studies curriculum help teach my kids who read below grade level?  Hah!  The following are some ways that I have used discarded texts:

• I cut out illustrations and maps from the pages of discarded social studies and science textbooks and paste them on index cards.  In some cases, I label the photos/maps and use them as visual cues for the kids as we are teaching.  In other cases, I put the labels on a separate card, and we use entire sets of cards as sorting  cards.  This is how I got a bunch of pictures of prominent people in the early history of the U.S., and now my kids can play a memory game, matching portraits to names.

• Some social studies textbooks in my district have full-page illustrations that are great for laminating and using in a variety of activities.  I found three old California history texts that had a full-page illustration of each type of resident of California.  I cut them out of the book and laminated them, and now we have an easy-to-read, completely labeled picture of a Spanish explorer, a California Native, a Mexican Ranchero, A Gold Rush Miner, and a Railroad builder.  I can create questions for kids to answer using the illustrations, or let kids use them to write sentences, among other activities.

• Textbooks from lower grades often have stories or information that applies to standards at higher grades.  I found a short and easy story about a pioneer child in a primary grades language arts textbook that my own students can use as we learn about westward expansion.  There was a nice little story about the American flag in an old first grade book that I cut out and laminated for my students.   On more than one occasion I’ve found texts I can use for upper grades science instruction in a kindergarten or first grade book.  You just never know! 

• Districts don’t just discard textbooks; there are a variety of other books and materials that become outdated and can be culled for use in differentiated instruction.  In past years, I’ve been able to find timelines to post in my room for history units, supplementary math workbooks to use, graphic organizers, maps, two globes,  posters, and games designed to use with specific textbook activities. 

• Other teachers have given me old story books they no longer use, and that’s how I’ve obtained a goodly number of Native American tales, easy biographies of scientists, books about farm life to use in colonial and pioneer units, fiction stories about fish to use in an ocean habitat unit, and picture books about stars and the solar system to use in science instruction.  I recently found a whole booklet a fellow teacher, at the kindergarten level, had given me about Native Americans.  It had been part of a Thanksgiving unit or something, but it contained a plethora of things I could use in American history at levels all of my students could read.

All kinds of books can be recycled and re-used in any classroom, if you’re creative enough. 

• Teaching materials you can purchase

Awhile back, when I had some extra money for my classroom, I purchased several books of reading material at the second and third grade levels for my kids in the fourth, fifth and sixth grade.  They were put to great use in our reading instruction.   I discovered later that they are also terrific for science and social studies.   In the second  grade reading book, I found short biographies of American leaders, five short texts about plants and plant life, three short pieces about stars, the sun, and galaxies, and about eight pages of text about different aspects of the human body.  All of them provide basic information with comprehension questions to answer, and all of them became parts of my different unit resources for social studies or science.

The third grade book had stories about ocean life, pieces about landforms (mountains, lakes, rivers), and short biographies of famous Native Americans.  Once again, perfect for our upper elementary social studies and science units!

As I was rummaging through my storage bins, I found some first and second grade level readers theater books I’d purchased at around the same time.  To my surprise, they had a bunch of short scripts that could be incorporated into our units of study:  one was about the solar system, one was about Johnny Appleseed, one was about the water cycle, and one was about Plains Indians.  Perfect!

Our local 99 cent store often has things I find useful.  I’ve gotten coloring books that have fairytale characters,  space and solar system pictures, and plants and flowers that can be incorporated into low-level literacy or science unit bins.  I’ve also found playing cards of the different American states, which are fabulous to use in US history.

I wouldn’t spend a lot of money on these kinds of materials, but if you find anything at used bookstores, discount stores, or yard sales, snap them right up.

• The internet:  materials to download

I have spent hours surfing the net for materials I can use with my students.  There are millions of websites with millions of things you can download or copy for free.  Most of my sorting card photos come from google images – the copyright laws allow you to use them in the classroom so long as you don’t disseminate them elsewhere.   I’ve gotten short stories and easy reading texts about science and social studies we have used for years.  I’ve pulled easy-to-read fairy tales and printed them out for kids to use.  You would be surprised at how much free stuff is out there that can be used directly or used to create other materials for our students.

I found a great site that described the different kinds of houses that Native Americans lived in, complete with pictures.  I printed out information on each type of housing on separate sheets of paper to be used in small groups or the document camera.  Even though the text may be too difficult for some kids to read on their own, it can be read aloud to them.  Then, I copied each of the photos and printed them to be used to sorting cards.  Now my students, who will be learning about how Native Americans in each region of the U.S. lived, will be able to match the pictures to the names of the houses, and thus demonstrate what they’ve learned.

• The internet:  materials to download for a fee

Whenever possible, I try to get what I need for teaching without paying anything out of my own pocket.   However, there are a variety of websites that have materials that are available to members who pay a small fee.  Over the years, I’ve purchased one-year memberships and downloaded everything I could before allowing my subscription to lapse.  I now have, saved on my school computer, my home laptop, and a flashdrive, an enormous library of materials that I can pull out as needed.

Enchanted Learning is a teacher website that provides materials and activities, mostly for k-3 levels, on a huge variety of topics.   The fee to join is less than $30, I believe, and  for that money, I’ve gotten booklets, worksheets, and activities related to math, science, social studies, and literary genres.  They form an integral part of my resource bins for both my own classroom and gen ed inclusion:

• The fifth grader with severe cognitive impairment can make a weather words wheel and learn several new sight words.
• The  student reading at grade 1 can learn about famous American leaders by reading easy books about George Washington, Abe Lincoln, Cesar Chavez, and  Martin Luther King.

One thing I love about Enchanted Learning is that each thematic unit has activities that cross strands of the curriculum.  Thus:

• Kids can practice alphabetizing lists of words related to units about the solar system, Christopher Columbus, the weather, seasons, and mammals.
• When we study analogies, kids can practice using facts or ideas related to science or social studies units.
• Similes and Antonym matching sheets are available for most of the science units I’m preparing.

I’ve gotten more than my money’s worth from Enchanted Learning, and no, they have not compensated me for this endorsement at all!

School Express is another one of those fabulous websites with hours of downloading fun.  By joining this year, I was able to obtain thematic units on a variety of science and social studies topics – everything from landforms to the Revolutionary War to a biography of Thomas Edison.  The text isn’t at most of my students’ levels, but it can be read aloud in most cases and provides an alternative or supplement  to the even harder social studies textbooks.   Each thematic unit has a fun activity booklet from which you can pull things for kids to do.

School Express also has e-workbooks with  very low level math and literacy learning opportunities.  I’ve gotten series of booklets to use in addition, subtraction, multiplication and division activities, phonics materials, grammar resources, and vocabulary support.  My library of writing prompts for sentences, paragraphs, and narrative stories has been greatly enhanced.  I added to my resources for the fairy tale genre unit by downloading all of the fairy tales in booklet form that kids can read and color.  All in all, this is a terrific site, and again, they have not rewarded me in any manner and have no idea that I’m recommending them on this blog.

Awhile back I purchased a one-year membership to Reading A-Z, an online teaching resource site that has leveled booklets you can download.  I downloaded everything I could at the lowest levels, and now I have them, permanently, to use.  Initially, they became an integral part of my guided reading instruction resources, as the stories could be easily copied and then used and re-used.  Later, I realized how many of them, both fictional and expository, can be used in conjunction with science and social studies instruction.  For example:

• The story about a salmon became part of the bin on Indians of the Pacific Northwest as well as the Rivers Habitat unit bin.
• Booklets about pond life include, at level A, “Pond Animals”, level B, “Pond Life”, Level D, “The Busy Pond”, and Level I, “Life at the Pond”.

Reading A-Z costs a little more than the other sites, but it provides enough materials make it worth the cost in many cases.  If you can get your school to reimburse you, more’s the better.  (And yet again, they have not compensated me in any way for this mention.)

accessing grade-level · accommodations · grade-level standards · lesson planning · modifications · resources · rigorous instruction · Sara Finegan · science · social studies · sorting cards · special education · teaching strategies

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