Make this Halloween spook-tacular and educational
October is a wonderful time in the classroom. Children have adjusted to being in school, routines are established, and learning is in full swing. Of course, for children of all ages (regardless of whether they have begun school yet or not), the Halloween holiday is the most exciting part of this month. That makes it easy to capitalize on children’s general enthusiasm for learning and their excitement about the holiday with some fun and educational Halloween worksheets.
Tracing words and outlines of shapes will give children the opportunity to practice their fine motor skills. As with all writing activities, I recommend giving children a golf pencil to write with instead of the standard size pencil. The smaller length of a golf pencil makes it easier for children to balance the pencil. Also, the traditional width (versus those “jumbo” pencils and crayons) is more comfortable for little fingers and allows children to grasp the pencil securely.
The Halloween worksheet highlighting directional words provides auditory processing practice along with opportunities to identify “right” and “left.” To get ready for this worksheet, you can play a “Simon Says” game with your child, asking him to move the right side or left side of his body as “Simon” requests. Remember, if you want to serve as a model for your child as he is learning to identify his left and right sides, stand in front of your child facing the same direction so your right leg, for example, is directly in front of his right leg. If you choose to face him so that you can monitor his movements, remember to reverse your motions, moving your left side when you say “right” so that your child moves his right side when he mimics or mirrors your actions.
Additional auditory processing is practiced with the worksheet that asks your child to listen to clues to find a specific picture. Remember to pause after you give your child a verbal clue to allow him to cross out any picture that does not fit the clue he just heard.
Syllable identification is an excellent way to help children “train their ears” to listen to sounds in words. This ability is an important pre-reading skill. Feel free to demonstrate for your child how to clap on each syllable or “word part” and then repeat your sample word, pausing very briefly between syllables so that your child can imitate the way you clapped. If your child is just beginning to listen for syllables, two-syllable compound words are a good place to start before introducing the Halloween worksheets. Words such as “baseball,” “rainbow” or “cowboy” are examples of these easy two-syllable words. Once your child gets the hang of clapping for each word part, he can try the Halloween worksheets for more practice.
The remaining Halloween worksheets provide a nice assortment of practice with additional skills such as sight word identification and identifying slight differences in similar images.
I hope your enjoy these fun Halloween worksheets with your little pirate, princess or spooky monster!
