Provides suggestions on how teachers can best manage their classrooms, how they can plan more effective lessons, a few simple procedures for fostering creative thinking and the art of imagining in their students, a look at student behavior, and some tips for keeping track of student skills. (Editor/RK)

Describes how implementing a free activities period at the beginning of the regular class day can encourage creative, independent art projects; development of positive self-attitudes; and reading and writing behaviors and can lower rebellious classroom behavior by providing students with some measure of classroom control. (CRH)

Developing Understanding of Self and Others (DUSO) provides a variety of activities for developing understanding of self and others. Gifted students not only can learn from the activities as structured in the kit, but also are encouraged to imagine and create variations on these activities. (Author)

Current theories about teaching children to read overemphasize use of the left brain hemisphere. Children with a right-hemisphere dominance are likely to experience difficulties unless reading experiences are planned which capitalize on right-brain characteristics: divergent thinking and creative activities, hands-on experiences, and free reading.…

Describes how poetry can be used with the different types of creative drama, including finger plays, pantomime and movement, Readers Theater, sensory awareness, storytelling, choral reading, action poems, role playing, and characterization. (MG)

Describes the development and growth of a program at a new York City public elementary school called Growing a Story: A Theatrical Exploration of Imagination for Literacy Enrichment. This arts educational program fosters students' pride of ownership, self-esteem, and interdependence through improvised creation and performance of original…

The road to competence in writing is best paved with joyful experiences, especially early experiences with writing in the elementary school. One such experience is writing a story and making a beautiful cloth-bound book. Materials needed, which are easily obtained, are: (1) a commercially produced material called Heat-N-Bond (Ultra); (2) mat board…

THE FOLLOWING IS THE FULL TEXT OF THIS DOCUMENT: It has been the goal of the staff and parents at Ramona Elementary School to provide more enriching opportunities for our students. We want to stimulate learning and expand our horizons in every area of the curriculum. Parents, community members, and the school staff work together to provide these…

The primary aim of the creative dramatics program detailed in this handbook is to give teachers a new teaching tool. Participants in the 45 staff development workshops during eight years have been classroom teachers, reading teachers, teachers from Head Start, teachers of special education and mathematics, resource teachers, librarians, and…

In introducing drama into the elementary classroom it is wise to start by having children portray that which they have experienced. First attempts should be short and simple with later attempts more complex and of longer duration. The first section of this bulletin offers numerous types of preliminary activities. The remainder of the booklet…

Virginia Standards of Learning for Kindergarten through fifth grade are listed in this paper with student activities related to observation of live theatre performances of "Pear Blossom's Magic: A Cinderella Story" written by George Wead. This play toured in Virginia in 1999-2000 and was performed by the high school theater touring…

Describes a science activity designed to stimulate creative thinking in children. The project, entitled Egg Loft,'' encourages students to devise methods for lifting an egg above 20 feet and returning it safely to ground. A number of the successful devices created and built by children are described. (JR)

Describes how one school developed six literature-based explorations involving an author of children's books that was intended to develop children's imaginations. (HOD)

Describes how a second-grade class used large templates to draw and paint five-digit numbers. The lesson integrated artistic knowledge and vocabulary with their mathematics lesson in place value. Students learned how draftspeople use templates, and they studied number paintings by Charles Demuth and Jasper Johns. (KM)

Discusses ways that arts and crafts can be integrated into content learning activities. Describes activities in a unit on animals in winter, noting that arts and crafts present an opportunity for children to demonstrate learning in new ways. (JW)