Free Printable Leveled Readers, Phonics Workbooks

Your new reader has just mastered her phonics lessons; she's reading with some fluency. But summer vacation is here. She won't have access to classroom readers. Do you buy a set of classroom readers to keep up her momentum? You can but you don't need to; there are free printable reading books, phonics books, spelling, vocabulary and grade leveled readers right here on the Internet. Or maybe you need some summer enrichment writing activities for your reluctant reader. He's not too crazy about reading to start with, and you are concerned about how the long summer will affect his phonics and reading skills. Certainly you need some reading and writing activities that your children will enjoy. You will also want free printable reading books, phonics books, spelling and writing activities that are easy to manage.

The sole reason many people hire a tutor for their children is that they feel inadequately prepared to teach them. It's important that if you elect to tutor your child at home, you feel confident and prepared. As a teacher, parent and former homeschooler myself, I can assure you that you can tutor your children at home. With the multitude of free printable reading books, spelling, writing activities and phonics lessons available, all you really need to do is assemble some materials for your child, spend a few moments each day on the writing activities, monitor his progress, and most importantly, relax and have fun.

This link offers over 30 free printable reading books and leveled readers to cut, color and assemble. Making booklets will be fun for you and your child to enjoy together. Print these booklets free of charge by simply submitting a valid email address. There are no fees. Naturally, Reading A-Z hopes that you may purchase more of their fine materials. That is your choice. Meanwhile you may enjoy the free booklets. These books are written according to grade level. There are stories that introduce science, social studies and other school content, while practicing phonics, syllables and spelling patterns. Enchanted Learning has more free printable reading books and leveled readersand booklets. DL-TK has many free printable reading books and leveled readers for preschool, emergent reader and early readers.

Free Printable Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs Activities

Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs is a wonderfully whimsical children's story written by Judi and Ron Barrett in 1982. Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs is a modern tall tale. Here are free printable Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs activities and lesson plans. There are reading lessons, writing activities, literature extensions, lessons in hyperbole, genre study and even a weather unit based on the book.

Ed Helper has several free printable Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs lesson plans. Check here for more free printable lesson plans based on Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs. This site has free printable Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs weather science activities.

Click here for free printable vocabulary and reading lesson plans from Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs. Here's a site with free printable vocabulary lessons based on Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs. And last but not least, for a little fun from all that study, free printable Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs movie coloring pages!

Free Printable Polar Express Party Planner Kit

Here's a Christmas holiday party for kids with literature connections. Print a free party kit from "The Polar Express" complete with games, crafts, party decorations, invitations, greeting cards, party favors and more. This party theme kit is based on the beloved book "The Polar Express" by Chris VanAllsburg and the hit holiday movie.

This free printable Polar Express party kit is perfect for those looking to host a secular Christmas holiday party and avoid religious Christmas themes.
Houghton-Mifflin, publishers of Vanallsburg's original book offer free Polar Express activities, coloring pages, crafts, games, coloring pages, Christmas tree ornaments and holiday decorations.

Here are just a few of the free printable activities--a Santa hat, poetry frame worksheet, Christmas card, North Pole sign, winter holiday party garland and patterns for snowflakes. Games includes puzzles, word search, fill in the blank and matching. Make Polar Express recipes including mint cookies and of course, hot chocolate! For healthier versions, make snowballs (popcorn balls), edible snow (popcorn with Parmesan cheese), Rudolph punch (cranberry and blood orange juice) and reindeer food (carrots, celery and sliced apples). String jingle bells on red ribbon or yarn for party crafts and give as party prizes. Make bird feeders by spreading peanut butter on pine cones and rolling in bird seed

Free Printable Series of Unfortunate Events Activities

A Series of Unfortunate Events, is an endearingly popular children's literature series. It's penned by the mysterious and elusive author Lemony Snicket. Despite the gloomy author's grim predictions that no one will like these kids books, millions of children and adults continue follow the Baudelaire children, Klaus, Violet and Sunny. Why not read this wonderful children's literature series with your students or homeschool kids? Here are free printable Series of Unfortunate Events worksheets and activities to supplement.

Lemony Snicket has over twenty different free printable Series of Unfortunate Events games, activities, coloring pages, word games, trivia, ciphers, crossword puzzles, fill-in-the-blanks, anagrams and activities based on works of children's literature. You'll love the activities using Sunny Baudelaire's baby talk to translate messages. Harper Collins, publisher of Lemony Snicket Series of Unfortunate Events free printable 20 page literature guide and activity book based on the Series of Unfortunate Events kids books. The illustrations come from the book and can be used as coloring pages. They lesson plans are called Lamentable Lesson Plans.

This site has free printable Lemony Snicket activities and games based on ASoUE kids books. Notably, there is a link for a free download of the complete Series of Unfortunate Events game for PC. There are also complete free printable Series of Unfortunate Events reading guides for the 13 kids books (of course he had to stop at unlucky number 13!) Lemony Snicket (Daniel Handler) is one intelligent dude. This link to Quiddich show that despite being children's literature, there are many adult allusions to history, literature and world events in the Series of Unfortunate Events kids books. These volumes of children's literature make excellent classroom literature for read-aloud and reader's workshop and teen novel study. The vocabulary is challenging, plots are complicated, characters are engaging and the concept riveting. Explore them in your school, library summer reading club, homeschool or book discussion group. The movies have been quite popular too.

Free Printable Shel Silverstein Printable Activities

Shel Silverstein is a beloved poet, children's author, musician and artist. He's given the world of children's literature dozens of books, poems and funny illustrations to enjoy. Shel passed away in 1999, but children's literature will never forget his charming, silly poems and books. A Light in the Attic, Where the Sidewalk Ends, Runny Babbit, The Giving Tree, Don't Bump the Glump, Lafdacio, the Lion Who Shot Back, A Giraffe and a Half, The Missing Piece, Falling Up are just a few of his delightful works of wit and whimsy. InSilverstein's poems, animals talk, grown-ups are silly and children rule the world from cardboard pirate ships. If you would like to play in his wonderful world, here are free printable Shel Silverstein activities, coloring pages and lesson plans.

There are free printable Shel Silverstein lesson plans, games and poetry writing prompts and activities for National Poetry Month in April. There are online Shel Silverstein games you can play.They each feature the funny characters from favorite Shel Silverstein poems. He's made free printable poetry writing prompts and activities booklets as well. These poetry writing prompts are perfect for classroom lesson plans, homeschool and library reading clubs But you don't need to be a teacher, librarian or even an adult to enjoy free printable lesson plans. His website is devoted to his favorite people: kids!

For young artists, cartoonists and poets, Silverstein designed a free printable poetry writing prompts and activities for children to illustrate. Kids will love creating their own poetry prompts and activities book about "Kate's Scissors" and all the funny things Kate cuts with her scissors. There's another poetry writing prompts activities booklet called "Eight Balloons" for children to make. There are Shel Silverstein themed crafts too. Here are free printable Giving Tree lesson plans. This Sweet Life is a blog with a free printable Shel Silverstein activities packet. Print crossword puzzles, word search, coloring pages and more. Teacher Vision has free printable Shel Silverstein activities, too.

Free Printable City of Ember Lesson Activities

The "City of Ember" book series, by Jeanne DuPrau, (2003) is a science-fiction post-apocalyptic fantasy series loved by students and educators alike. Many elementary, intermediate and middle schools are incorporating City of Ember books into their classroom curriculum. With the release of a movie version students can read and study the books and follow up with the film version for comparison. Here are free printable City of Ember book activities, movie study guides and lesson plans.

The series chronologically is City of Ember, People of Sparks, Prophet of Yonwood and Diamond of Darkhold. Not all have been made into film so there are movie study guides only for City of Ember. But there are book activities for all books. Here are free printable lesson plans for teaching the City of Ember book series. Lesson Planet is a pay site with some free book activities to print. Here arefree printable City of Ember lesson plans. Scholastic also charges for many of their printables. But here is a City of Ember book discussion guide to print free. Here are more free printable City of Ember lesson plans for teachers of middle school and homeschool parents. The movie study guides are really helpful for preparing book activities.

This free printable lesson plans kit includes story maps, worksheets, book activities, character webs, comprehension questions, movie study guides, vocabulary, grammar, symbolism, cause and effect, analysis and application questions, synthesis and evaluation questions, book activities, games, reading response rubrics, charts, quizzes and more. The City of Ember books are a dystopian series that tells of a people that has suffered depletion. They've gone underground, to re-emerge at a given time in the future. City of Ember is Orwellian science fiction, reminiscent of 1984, Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451 and Aldous Huxley's Brave New World and The Hunger Games series by Suzanne Collins. Use book activities and movie study guides for units on science fiction.

Free Printable WordWorld Lesson Plans

PBS Kids offers superb, educational television show that kids love! For early childhood learners, WordWorld is an emergent reading cartoon for preschool children ages toddler to six. Every animal, character and object in WordWorld is made of that word. Children learn simple preschool words like dog, barn, bridge, house, fence, sun, tree and flower on WordWorld.

Parents of preschool children, if you haven't explored the cartoon WordWorld or if you are already familiar with the reading activities on this show, here are some free printable WordWorld lesson plans to follow up with WordWorld episodes. There are free printable preschool WordWorld coloring pages featuring the characters from WordWorld: duck, pig, frog, dog, bear and sheep. Visit PBS Kids for the free printable WordWorld activities for early childhood on the homepage. You will find an interactive map of WordWorld with lots of reading activities and word picture fun. There are free online WordWorld games as well as build a word adventures. Fill your word box with WordWorld words that you find on the website.

WordWorld is an excellent website for preschool and early childhood lesson plans. Use these reading activities in early childhood special education, elementary school, day care, homeschool and reading activities for tutoring. Since WordWorld comes from PBS, you know it's a school-approved website that's as safe, fun and educational. For more free safe early childhood online gaming, visit Free Safe Kids Games and for more printables and reading activities visit Free Printable Lesson Plans.

Free Printable Animal and Plant ABC Book

Realistic coloring pages. Alphabet letter outlines with illumination style pictures inside; plants and animals whose names start with the letter. Free printable booklet for science, reading and art lessons! Summer coloring fun. Great for preschool and kindergarten science learning centers and lesson plans.

http://www.tlsbooks.com/pdf/plantandanimalcoloringpacket.pdf
http://www.tlsbooks.com/plantandanimalcoloringpacketanswerkey.pdf

Free Printable Model Trains, Railroad Crafts

Model railroad building is a popular hobby. Back in the day, many men were given scale model train sets as kids and continue to enjoy them as adults. So here's news for model trains geeks--free printable scale model railroad paper building models, miniatures and accessories. With your printer, card stock paper and an exacto knife, you can create a diorama for your scale model train sets.

About Miniatures lists sites for free printable model trains, model railroad accessories. Pay sites are marked "vendor" but many are free. Vendor sites also offer some free printables as samples. The page links to free printable scale model train sets and paper building models for your model railroad. You can print and make circa 1700s building models, an old church and some Dickensian scenery.

This is a wonderful site for all your free printable scale model railroad needs. This site has pieces for HO and O scale model trains. Someone has done a lot of work to make free printable model train sets, buildings, scenery, set pieces, accessories and miniatures available. There are whole free printable scale model railroad town sets which would work great for social studies cultural and literature setting dioramas. Some pieces for scale model trains double as dollhouse miniatures, too!

Odissey [sic] has free printable model train sets and scale building models, Gothic and Victorian building models, floor maps, and scale model miniatures. Teachers and homeschool parents can turn these free printable scale model trains into lesson plans. Use free easier printable model railroad accessories for hands-on crafts, preschool and special education learning centers and harder scale model railroad pieces for units on trains, technology, Industrial Revolution and historical dioramas.

Free Printable Jigsaw Puzzles, Crossword, Word Search, Word Games

Free Printable Jigsaw Puzzles and Free Puzzles Generator Free printable jigsaw puzzles, word games, crossword puzzles, cryptograms, word searches, mazes and other puzzles. Free puzzle generator to make your own puzzles, word games and lesson plans for all ages to enjoy. Puzzles and word games make great testing tools to evaluate student comprehension of content.

Click here for free printable jigsaw puzzles. Billy Bear4 Kids has all sorts of free printable puzzles and online puzzles. There are different kinds of puzzle generators for crossword puzzles, jigsaw puzzles, sudoku and cryptograms. Here are ready-made online and free printable jigsaw puzzlesfrom the Jigsaw place. Tim's Printables has free printable jigsaw puzzle generators and templateswith patterns to print images on for kids to color. There are crosswords, chess game boards and pieces, sudoku, mazes, word searches and other puzzles games.

Kids Scraps has free printable jigsaw puzzles, crossword and sudoku puzzles and puzzle generators for children in themes of animals: jungle, vehicles, toys, farmyard, pets, reptiles, holiday themed puzzles like Easter, Christmas, Valentine's Day and Halloween. Activity Village has free printable jigsaws on themes from around the world. There are also word puzzles and crossword puzzles for science, social studies, math, language arts, music; almost any subject area. DL-TK has free printable jigsaw puzzles, sudoku puzzles and puzzle generators for children on themes of Bible, holidays, animals, vehicles, toys, science and more. 

Free Printable Holy Week Activities, Lesson Plans

Here are free printable Holy Week activities and Catholic Easter printables. Free printables includes coloring pages, word searches, crossword puzzles, cryptograms, games, crafts, cut and paste activities and much more. There are liturgical resources: prayers, Bible mass readings, reflections, devotions, Lenten lessons on sacrifice, almsgiving, fasting, corporal and spiritual works mercy. There are so many activities in this resource guide, that you will probably not be able to finish these Holy Week activities during Lent or even Eastertide.
Catholic Mom has a free printable Lenten lessons and Holy Week activities in a resource guide. Bookmark Catholic Mom for loads of Catholic printables. Here's a free printable Journey to Pascha workbooks for kids covering the Passion, death, resurrection of Jesus at Easter. Childrens Ministry has free Holy Week activities, craft projects, games, Lenten lessons, family activities and Bible devotions. This link has nearly 100 free printable Bible word searches from Catholic mass reading in the lectionary. These word searches are challenging, interactive and fun! These free printables would make excellent follow up to the mass readings. Here is a very complicated and challenging printable Catholic Easter crossword puzzle. This link has free printable Catholic Easter games and puzzles.

Apples 4 the Teacher has three pages of free printable Catholic Easter coloring pages. Each link has ten free printables for a total of thirty Easter and Holy Week activities. Use these coloring pages for Lenten lessons. Color Jesus, the cross, the tomb, the Eucharist, palms, Bible story pictures and more. DL-TK has free printable Catholic Easter games, Lenten lessons, memory cards, craft projects, coloring pages and word games for Holy Week activities. And for the best online resource in free printable Catholic coloring pages, visit St. John the Baptist Religious Ed. You can print Catholic Easter coloring pages of Stations of the Cross (way of sorrows), Joyful, Sorrowful, Glorious and Sorrowful mysteries of the rosary, Bible stories of Easter, Catholic saints and loads more printables. 

Free Printable Calendars, Lesson Planners, Grade Book

Print Free has gobs and gobs of free printable calendars in tons of different views and configurations. There are monthly calendar printouts, weekly date planners, year-at-a-glance, two-month calendars and online organizers. Choose from different patterns and themes. Select vertical or horizontal style personal planners. Opt for major holidays to be included. There's nothing to download. Just choose the style you want, point and shoot (or click and print, in this case).

Print 2016 Calendars has a vast array of free printable calendars in month styles. Fonts differ by bold, large-print and outline design. Print your online organizers as in grid, bookmark, year-at-a-glance and other styles. These calendar printouts open in PDF or Microsoft Word format (you have to have those software tools installed and enabled to open and print).

Here are tools for online organizers and personal planners to create free printable calendarsfrom Calendar Labs. Add in religious holidays from your specific faith--dates for those are included. Perhaps your religion follows a different calendar, like Hebrew, Islam or Indian. This tool will help you generate and customize a (western year) calendar.

Here's yet another link for free printable calendars to customize. Win Calendar has a really nice, easy-to-use layouts for online organizers. Design personal planners and calendar printouts in the style that works best for you.

Free Printable Play Money for Math

Parents, if you want a sure-fire fun kids' activity, you can bank on play money being a hit. Elementary, kindergarten and preschool teachers use play currency, coins and bills in a variety of money math lessons. Here are free printable coins, bills and play money. Homeschool parents will want to use these free printable play currency for money math lessons also.

Printable Play Money has all denominations and styles of free printable coins, bills and play money you might ever need for your lessons. There are cut-out coin worksheets, counting coins, money math lessons, worksheets, activities and making change lessons. There are free printable sheets of pennies, dimes, nickels and quarters to cut out and use for counting and making change. Printable Play Money also has free printable bills and US currency in several denominations. Print play one dollar, five dollar, ten dollar, twenty dollar, fifty dollar and one hundred dollar bills. Some styles are replicas of US mint currency and some are obviously play money. 

Free Printable Motorcycle models, motorcycle activities

Motorcycles fascinate almost every boy I know and many girls, too. The ultimate fantasy for a many a man and boy is to take off for weeks of travel on a motorcycle, seeing the sights from his bike. Movies like The Motorcycle Diaries and books such as Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance show just how addictive the riding of a motorcycle can be.
If you or someone you love is crazy about motorcycles, then you need these free printable coloring pages featuring over one hundred different types of motorcycles. You can print classic Harley-Davidson sportsters and hogs, vintage Norton, Ariel and BSA, crotch rockets, Japanese speed racing bikes, BMW touring bikes and many more motorcycles.
I carefully weeded out all the internet links that aren't user-friendly and narrowed it down to four websites that have the easiest coloring pages to print. No user ID is required. No download or Java required. You may need Adobe Acrobat reader for a few, but most of the coloring pages are simple click and print coloring pages. You will also need to turn off any pop-up blocker you may be using. This enables you to open the coloring page window. You can turn off pop-up blockers from the Internet Explorer Tools link.
http://www.coloring-pages-kids.com/coloring-pages/transportation-coloring-pages/motorcycles-coloring-pages/motorcycles-coloring-pages-gallery.php This is a site I don't often use, not because I don't like it, but just because I haven't seen many coloring pages from the site. They seem to feature free printable coloring pages grouped by subject. Coloring-Pages-Kids has a nice assortment of motorcycle coloring pages. Some are whimsical and cartoon images. Others are more realistic and detailed.
http://www.coloring-fun.com/motorcycle-coloring-pages.html Not so large a variety but still some very nice free printable motorcycle coloring pages.
http://www.coloring-pages-book-for-kids-boys.com/harley-davidson-coloring.html These ttwo links come from the same website. I've listed them seperately because one page features all Harley-Davidson motorcycles and the other webpage is more generic motorcycles. I also listed each link seperately because this website while very well laid out, complete, detailed and user-friendly, is difficult to access from URL bars. Bookmark both this link and the next for ease in finding and saving. I've had trouble getting back to the site without these links. And you will want to return to this site frequently for free printable motorcycle and vehicle coloring pages. Not only are there coloring pages featuring specific and clearly labeled vehicles, but also engine and bike components. Some of these coloring pages are more like schematic diagrams. They could easily be used to teach drawing skills for motorcycles.
http://www.coloring-pages-book-for-kids-boys.com/motorcycle-coloring-page.html Bookmark this for the webpage of general motorcycles. Over 70 free printable motorcycle coloring pages on this page. Easy to print.
Enjoy these free printable motorcycle coloring pages! I love them because now I don't have to free draw motorcycles for coloring pages enthusiasts! My coloring pages look cubist rather than realistic!

Free Printable Paper Airplanes, Aviation Lesson Plans

Free Printable Coloring Pages has over 50 free printable airplane coloring pages and paper airplane patterns. Yes Coloring has loads of free printable vehicles coloring pages. There are over 60 airplane coloring pages to print free. Airplanes are detailed, accurate and challenging to color. 

Educators, you'll love that the airplane coloring pages that focus not only on the whole plane, but on individual parts of the airplane. These airplane coloring pages are more than just fun coloring; as the child is also learning about the engineering and electronics of airplane design! Airplane coloring pages are drafting lessons in themselves. There are dozens of airplane and helicopter styles also. Each is labeled with the proper aircraft name and number.

Now how about free printable paper airplanes for kids to make? Start here with basic paper airplanes and paper airplane patterns. Now click over here for more complicated patterns for paper airplanes. Hit Everything Mom for a collection of free printable paper airplanes in a variety of styles. Last, visit this site for a free printable paper airplanes featuring vintage WWI and WWII planes. Check out the 3D models of fire trucks and emergency vehicles too.

Free Printable Jewish Passover Lesson Plans, Hebrew Pesach activities

Passover, also called Pesach, is a high point of the Jewish year. Explore the passover celebration with these free printable coloring pages, crafts, party games, word searches, puzzles, crossword and worksheets. Great for Hebrew Passover or Pesach party planning also!

Passover or Pesach, is a high celebration in the Jewish Hebrew calendar. Passover is an eight-day holiday, beginning with two days of no work, four days of limited work and ending with two days of no work. The Passover celebration includes several Seder meals, with roast lamb, bitter herbs and matzo bread. Passover, or Pesach commemorates the passing over of the angel of death during the ten plagues of Egypt. God punished the Egyptians for the enslavement of the Hebrews. First born male infants were to die unless the blood of a lamb was put on the lintels and door posts. Passover, or Pesach, is part of Christian calendar as well; it was at the Passover meal that Jesus instituted the Holy Eucharist or communion.

Passover doesn't fall on the same date every year. In the Jewish Hebrew calendar Passover falls in the month of Nissan. In the Gregorian or western calendar, Passover falls in March or April. In 2016, Passover begins at sundown on April 22 and runs till April 30. Here are free printable activities to explore the Passover. Start at Chabad for a guide to Passover. Here is the Jewish Kids Pesach site. Use these for classroom instruction, homeschool, religious education and Hebrew school. Here arefree printable Pesach greeting cards. Torah Tots has free printable Passover games, coloring pages, kids crafts, worksheets, lesson plans, greeting cards and more.

About Homeschooling has nine free printable Passover lessons, puzzles, word games, crossword, word search, DL-TK has free printable Passover kids crafts, Torah and Bible crafts, games and puzzles. Artists Helping Children has many printable Jewish Passover kids crafts. Fun Family Crafts has free printable Passover kids crafts for children on Torah and Bible stories of Moses, the Ten Commandments, the 10 Plagues of Egypt, the Exodus and more. Care has 10 very tasteful free printable Pesach kids crafts. Paper Crafts has a nice free printable cut and paste Hebrew menorahfor Passover and other holy day prayers. Free Kids Crafts has three pages of free printable patterns for Jewish Passover crafts (be sure to click through all three pages).

Free Printable American History Maps, Timelines, Charts and Graphs

Competition for the National Geographic National Geography Bee is heating up! Kids from all over are honing their geography skills to hopefully qualify. Teachers and homeschool parents, here arefree printable world maps for social studies lesson plans and geography bee activities. Eduplace has over sixty free printable outline maps for use in social studies class and geography lessons. Have students make free printable world maps for social studies homework and to study for tests.

There are about ten different world maps for geography lessons. There are also outline maps from each continent, country and region. Use free printable outline maps for world and local geography. There is one page with free printable historical maps to help students understand how areas were labeled at different times in history. US History also offers free printable world history maps from famous times and places.

All free printable world maps are outline maps, meaning that they're drawn as outlines of the country, continent or region. Free printable outline maps are labeled with cities and major landforms. You can print the maps with labels for students to use for practice and memorization. There are also printable maps without labels. Use these for practice, study guides, quizzes and tests. With or without labels, outline maps are identical so that there is no confusion between the two. Check the homepage for more free printable geography lessons, social studies activities and American history worksheets.

Free Printable Purim Lesson Plans for Jewish Kids

The Jewish celebration of Purim begins at sundown on 14th day of Adar in the Hebrew calendar. That's March 4, 2015. Purim celebrates the bravery and wisdom of a Jewish girl, Esther. Esther became queen of Ahasuerus, King of Persia. Here are free printable Purim activities and Jewish lesson plans to help children learn about Queen Esther.

Read the Purim story. King Ahasuerus's first wife Queen Vashti was very beautiful. One night the King demanded she parade naked in front of his guests. She refused and was executed. King Ahasuerus sought a new queen and liked Esther, niece of the leader of exiled Jews, Mordecai, Haman, evil prime minister to Ahasuerus, hated Mordecai. He connived to get Ahasuerus to decree that everyone should bow to the King. Jews bow only to Yahweh. Jews refused and Mordecai was to hang. Queen Esther pleaded with the king for her people (risky even for the Queen as it was forbidden to approach without a summons). Ahasuerus's heart was softened and Haman was put to death instead.

Throw a Purim party. Torah Tots is one-stop visit for Purim recipes, crafts, printables, lessons, books and films. Check out the Purim spiel (play) ideas to put on your own Torah presentation. Chabad has a complete Purim holiday guide for families. Kids will love making Hamantaschen (Haman Hats) and dressing up like Queen Esther, Mordecai, Ahasuerus and Haman.

Teach Purim with free printable Purim puzzles to reinforce story. Print word searches, crossword puzzles, word games and worksheets. Use for study guides. Teacher Planet has dozens of free printable Purim lesson plans, activities, crafts, unit ideas, games and puzzles.

Make Purim crafts. Chadis Crafts has free printable Purim craft projects, yarn crafts, coloring, puzzles and activities. Artists Helping Children always has neat craft projects. Check out their free printable Purim crafts, There are mask crafts too.

Each year Jewish observances fall on different days in the western calendar but it's the same in the Hebrew one. Whatever your religion or faith, Purim makes a cracking good story and kids will enjoy learning about it.

Free Printable Inkheart Activities, Lessons

March is National Reading Month, and what better time to explore best loved children's literature classics? The movie Inkheart was based on a trilogy of books by Cornelia Funke, including Inkheart, Inkspell and Inkdeath. This wonderful set of medieval type fantasy literature continues to thrill readers as the film did in 2009. Destined to become a children's literature classic, here are free printableInkheart lesson plans, fantasy coloring pages and activities based on the Cornelia Funke collection. Check EdHelper for free printable Inkheart book activities. Scholastic has a free printable Inkheart literature guide for Cornelia Funke books Inkspell and Inkdeath and companion movies.

The movie website at Warner Bros. has downloads including a free printable Inkheart activity booklet. Keep the Inkheart magic alive with beautifully illustrated word puzzles, word games, crossword, mad-libs, maze, hidden messages, design a fantasy butterfly and more. Each activity page can be enjoyed as a coloring page as well. The drawings are intricate and whimsical and will help readers respond to Inkspell and Inkdeath as they read them.

Beyond that, there aren't too many Cornelia Funke Inkheart, Inkspell or Inkdeath coloring pages available online, so here are general fantasy and medieval coloring pages. Here's a page of free printable Inkheart activities and lesson plans as well. Here are a few Inkheart lesson plans that cover Inkspell and Inkdeath, too. Cornelia Funke has written a literary classic which became a much-loved movie with Brendan Frasier, Andy Serkis Helen Mirren, Jim Broadbent and Paul Bettany. Lovers of fantasy books will love joining Mo, Meggie, Dustfinger, Farid, Resa and all the fantastical characters of Inkheart. And maybe filmmakers will make Inkspell into a sequel?

Free Printable Tale of Despereaux Activities, Lesson Plans

The Tale of Despereaux is a charming children's literature book which has been made into a movie. It's an epic medieval love story of mouse sized proportions! 

Here are free printable Tale of Despereaux lesson plans, including a book discussion guide from Scholastic. Here are free printable  packet of activities from the Tale of Despereaux with core English Language Arts (ELA) curriculum connections. Printable Worksheets also has free printable Tale of Despereaux ELA lessons packet. Activity Village has free printable Tale of Despereaux coloring pages, a mouse mask, games and puzzles. Coloring Book Info has Tale of Despereaux coloring pages featuring the pint-sized medieval hero.

Here's one more packet of ELA lessons from The Tale of Despereaux. This story could work with ELA lessons on the Redwall series by Brian Jacques. DL-TK has some cute free printable mouse crafts and coloring pages to use for Tale of Despereaux ELA lessons. Here are free printable fantasy coloring pages and medieval crafts and activities to supplement ELA lessons and activities.

Free Printable Snowflake Patterns, Lessons and Activities

 Paper snowflakes make a great educational tools for science and math lesson plans. Cutting paper snowflakes is also fun! Here are free printable snowflake patterns, templates and stencils. Children learn math skills by exploring symmetry, shapes and geometric patterns in six-sided snowflakes. Students explore art concepts by cutting snowflakes. They learn pattern, line, shape and design. Children learn about earth science by creating snowflake patterns that simulate ice crystal formations. Students improve motor skills by cutting paper snowflake patterns. They improve perceptual skills by folding paper to create the six-sided snowflake patterns.

Marcel's Kid Crafts has free printable snowflake patterns and paper snowflakes to print and color. Easy folding and cutting instructions printed on snowflake pattern. Use these patterns for ages 9 and up. First Palette has more free paper snowflake templates to print.

Paper Snowflakes has free printable snowflake stencils and templates. Directions are more complicated. You can find free printable snowflake games, puzzles and patterns on this site. These patterns work well for younger children or special needs children. They are easier and less frustrating.

While students are cutting their snowflake patterns, explain the water cycle. Here are free printable water cycle worksheets, plus snow and crystals lesson plans. Use the printable water cycle poster to teach the three states of matter, using steam, water and ice to demonstrate.

Read "Snowflake Bentley" by Jaqueline Briggs Martin. This beautifully illustrated Caldecott Medal winner, tells the story of Wilson 'Snowflake' Bentley, photographer who first captured snowflakes on film and showed their unique hexagonal patterns. For a great closure to your snowflakes lessons, serve fruit juice snowcones as a classroom treat!

Free Printable Jewish Holocaust Memorial Lesson Plans

January 27 on western calendar is one of days of yom hashoah or "days of remembrance." It isn't a holiday, but it is a holy day and commemorates International Holocaust Remembrance Day, sJews observe Yom Hashoah, Jewish Holocaust Memorial Day, on the 27th of Nissan (April to May in the Western calendar). January 27 is the day the world remembers (or should) when it stood by while millions died--Pole, Slav, Catholic, Russian, red, disabled, dissident, gypsy, gay, and many, many Jewish--in the World War II Nazi genocide. 

Holocaust Memorial Day Trust has a free activity pack. The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum offers ways to share stories online and in person. Oral tradition is a time-honored way of preserving memories.