Here’s five free and frugal ideas you can use for educational pursuits today!
1. REPURPOSE plastic pieces leftover from broken or partially misplaced games.
Use them for new game markers for:
- homemade or TpT games (like the ones in my store)
- sorting
- matching
- counting
- one-to-one correspondence
2. ACCESS tumblebooks.com to read and/or listen to thousands of FREE books with audio and highlighted text.
- You can sort by type of book, age, reading level, etc.
- If you have an account with your local library, be sure to ask if they have a tumblebooks account. We are able to access it completely FREE with our library’s code!
- This site is formatted to work on tablet devices as well as your laptop!
3. TRY simple scientific experiments with your students!
They can be done with items you DEFINITELY have on hand and will DEFINITELY inspire your students to seek out even more LEARNING opportunities!
- A review of the Commutative Property with four glasses of water, two with a smaller but equal amount and two with a larger but equal amount.
- Does it matter if you add the glass with the lesser amount of water to the glass with the larger amount OR if you add the glass with the larger amount to the glass with the lesser amount?
- No it doesn’t! Whether you add 4 + 6 for instance or 6 + 4, you still get 10!
- Try it especially if your students are struggling to understand why the two amounts are in fact equal no matter which way you add them up!
- All you need for this experiment is MAGNETS of various sizes and objects to test whether they are magnetic or not!
- If you have them, brass brads are the MOST FUN, especially with a large and very attractive magnet!
- Challenge your students to see how many they can pick up with just one magnet!
4. GO OUTSIDE and explore in nature.
Whether you can find a nearby creek or just a nearby tree or field to explore, get outside and see what you can discover with your students! The world is our classroom!
5. SAVE PAPER and packaging you find in products you buy.
It has so many uses, not to mention it doesn’t end up in the trash or recycling bin quite yet!
- Paper piecing: you might notice the chicken pictures in the picture below. They were created with scrap papers including another piece of brown paper that was salvaged from packaging!
- The history projects on the top of the shelves in the picture below were also saved from the round file! They were intended to be the back of some cubeical shelves, but my Dad made me real wood back instead. These very sturdy (but still paper) boards were the perfect size for 2nd grade history projects!
Here is a close-up shot of one of the projects in progress!
- Instant mural! (this paper below that our children turned into a mural of space “and other things” was wadded up as padding in a package of books I ordered.
These ideas are free and frugal, yet they are sure to enrich the education of those you teach! If you have some more ideas, PLEASE do SHARE in the comments!
