TpT

How to Keep Students Engaged Over Valentine’s Day

February 4, 2026 by Amy Leave a Comment

One year while teaching first grade I had students of varying abilities – not just within a small range, but the entire spread of elementary school, and in reading, writing, AND math. Putting kids in different reading groups isn’t a novel concept, but having multiple math groups threw me for a bit. I had a consistent group of high-achieving students who could finish their work fast or test out of the regular assignments completely, and I needed work that they could do independently: work that would engage them, challenge them, and keep them using a variety of skills.

How to Keep Students Engaged Over Valentine's Day — How to Keep Students Engaged Over Valentine’s Day

That’s when I developed math project-based learning assignments. These projects excited my kids like nothing else had, and they chose do to similar projects over and over again.

That’s why I created this Valentine’s Day PBL Party Project. It’s the exact same project I gave my students, which they loved, and there’s no one right answer, so different students or groups can make it their own.

Here’s how it works: print out the project pages and give students the scenario page first. Discuss it with them to be sure they understand the project, and then distribute the rest. Their task is to plan a fictional class Valentine’s party, and they can choose the party elements – but they must stay within the parameters of the project (location, budget, etc.). My students always chose their favorite options first, which ended up being expensive – and so in reworking their party plan to fit the parameters, they ended up doing the math over and over again, so … goals met. 🙂

You can find out more about this Valentine’s Day PBL Party Project here.

Even though my students knew they weren’t planning a real party, they loved doing this – and I bet your students will, too! If you give this Valentine’s Party PBL a try, leave a review and let me know what they think.

How do you keep your students engaged and learning during the Valentine’s season?

It’s Time for a TpT Cyber Sale + a Giveaway

November 25, 2025 by Amy Leave a Comment

I don’t know about you, but life is especially crazy for me at this time of year. With holidays coming in waves and our routine disrupted, everything feels a bit more stressful than it normally does – even the good things.

Save up to 25% at the TpT Cyber Sale on December 1-2 with code CYBER25.

That’s why I’m happy that TpT is hosting a sale next week; it’s a great time to snag resources that will save you time – and energy – during this busy season. During the sale on December 1-2, you can save up to 25% with the code CYBER25 – and the entire A Nest in the Rocks store will be on sale.

These resources might be just what you need to keep your students engaged and your mind at peace.

Keep your students engaged and in a holiday frame of mind while engaging with poetry and creative writing.

Get your students digging into the classic poem ‘Twas the Night Before Christmas – and doing a bit of their own creative writing. Find it here.

Hexagonal Thinking Activities for Any Novel

Students love cooperative learning, and hexagonal thinking activities support students who struggle with abstract concepts and encourage critical thinking. This resource can be used with any novel – get it here.

Mock trials are a great way to keep your students focused and engaged!

Do your students love arguing as much as mine? This mock trial resource allows them to argue with a purpose, and they love digging into the evidence to prove that their side is right! Get it here.

The Mr. Lemoncello series by Chris Grabenstein is fun for kids and also encourages kindness, teamwork, and finding fun in learning. Get all the resources you need to engage students in many ways here.

To help you stretch your cash even further, I’m giving away a $10 TpT gift card! Entering is easy, and you have lots of options to increase your chances of winning. I’ll notify the winner on Monday, December 1, so make sure you enter before then!

Enter here.

Who do you teach? What are your favorite things to teach – or the ones you’d love to have done for you? Let me know in the comments below!

Who wants to win a gift card?

February 3, 2024 by Amy Leave a Comment

How is it already February – with Valentine’s Day staring us down? Where has so much of the school year gone – but how do we keep our students engaged through the monotonous days of winter – and the even harder days of spring?

As much as I love the continuity that this time of year provides my students, boredom can easily set in, too – and that’s why I love that the TpT Winter Sale is happening next week! You can save up to 25% with the code FEBSALE24 – and my entire store will be on sale.

Get all the details about TpT’s upcoming winter sale and find out how to score a gift card here.

Here are some resources that may fit that seasonal need for you in the coming weeks:

Read on to learn more about this PBL project with a Valentine’s Day theme.

This PBL project is the perfect way to sneak in some math and collaborative learning while your students plan a fictional Valentine’s party. The resource sets creative parameters and your students work together to plan a fictional class party – all the while doing math and practicing their writing, planning, and organizational skills.

Your students will love studying poetry with this bracket challenge!

It’s almost time for that famous basketball playoff event … ahem, apparently it’s a big deal to sports fanatics? I’m clearly not one of those, but I love taking that same enthusiasm and hype and applying it to something more my speed – like digging into creative poetry in fun ways. This Poetry Bracket Challenge for Elementary Students comes with hyperlinks suggested poems to use for this activity, unit study-style activities to extend learning, and printable poetry pages where copyrights allow – as well as the actual bracket you can use to customize this project with your students. Simply choose the activities that you’d like to use and do as much or as little as you’d like.

Introduce your students to the real Patrick Henry with this biographical scavenger hunt.

This Patrick Henry Scavenger Hunt is the perfect way to introduce your students to the man famous for declaring, “Give me liberty, or give me death!” With quotes from his letters and speeches, as well as personal stories and politics, this resource follows Henry throughout his life. It can be used as a scavenger hunt, gallery walk, or simple cooperative learning activity, asking your students to read informational passages to find answers and decode mystery words. Also included are a variety of reflective and creative writing prompts to extend learning.

Spring is the time for weddings, so this is the perfect time to introduce this Romeo and Juliet summative project.

Since spring is the time for wedding planning, I have to share this newish resource there – and because my students loved it! Create a Wedding Album for Romeo and Juliet is a digital resource designed to help your students do just that. (You can ask them to design an album based on the wedding they had in the play, or to imagine what it might have been like if they’d had a more traditional wedding – which allows for all sorts of creativity connected to characterization and traditions!) It makes the perfect summative project, but your students could also work on it as you read the play, and it can be done individually or cooperatively. It’s very open-ended, so you have lots of room to make the assignment what you want it to be – but there’s enough here for your students to be super creative and demonstrate their understanding of the play while giving you some room to breath.

I love resources that you can use over and over, don’t you? That mileage is important to me – and that’s one reason I love these Hexagonal Thinking Activities for Any Novel. There’s serious bang for your buck here, but more importantly, kids love’em – and by putting manipulatives to critical thinking and literary analysis, students of all skill levels can be successful. Want to know more about hexagonal thinking? Check out this post.

Find out all about this print-ready Hexagonal Thinking resource for use with MacBeth here.

PS – I just finished MacBeth, and we had such fun with this play! It’s so perfect for hexagonal thinking activities that I had to make one. Grab it here.

There you have it! These are my top resource recommendations for the upcoming weeks. What do you need to help your spring go smoothly?

I love picking out TpT resources that will save time for me or that will expose my students to a concept in a way that I wouldn’t have thought to use. I want you to get these things for your students, too! That’s why I’m offering a $10 TpT gift card to one winner on Tuesday, February 8, just in time for sale shopping. Enter to win using the rafflecopter below.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

How to Introduce Graphic Novels to your Students

November 16, 2023 by Amy Leave a Comment

This post uses affiliate links. They don’t cost anything for you but do help to support this blog. Thanks for using them!

Do you use graphic novels in your classroom?

I haven’t yet, but I want to, and as I’ve been reading them in preparation for this, I realize that there’s much more to them than I originally thought.

For instance, there’s lots of vocabulary connected to the things that make graphic novels unique. Motion lines, panels, gutters, speech and thought bubbles, and much more – these are important words to know when discussing graphic novels.

If I’m going to use them with my students, then I definitely want them to be able to discuss them intelligently, and that means knowing about and understanding this vocabulary.

How to Introduce Graphic Novels to your Students

Taking that a step further, we can also analyze all of these elements That will add depth to the story and allow us to look not only at how the author crafted the story itself but how the artist adds to that through the use of color, lines, spacing, lettering, and much more.

So students need to know these things before they dig into a graphic novel for a lesson, and we need to teach it, but I don’t want that to be boring. I think it should be just as exciting as the graphic novels themselves – and that’s why I’ve created a scavenger hunt that will both engage your students and teach them many important elements of graphic novels!

This image shows the student directions and mission cards for the Graphic Novel Scavenger Hunt. — How to Introduce Graphic Novels to your Students

The scavenger starts with a direction card and a mission card for your students. The mission references the brand new Escape from Mr. Lemoncello’s Library graphic novel, so it will fit perfectly with that – but you could use this resource to introduce these elements before beginning any graphic novel unit. (Pssst – why should you use this book? Find out here)

There are ten code word cards. Each of these cards features a short information reading passage and a question that leads to a code word that’s found on a different card. As the teacher, you choose whether to hang the cards around the room like a gallery walk, place them on tables, or hide them – it’s up to you.

This image depicts one of the code word cards with a reading passage and the student answer sheet for the Graphic Novel Scavenger Hunt. — How to Introduce Graphic Novels to your Students

To find the code words, the students move in groups throughout the space to read the cards and find the code words. They’ll likely need to read the cards several times to find all of the code words, which will help them to remember the information. They add the code words to their answer sheet and then unscramble the letters to find the mystery word.

I’ve also included a reflective writing prompt that can be used for group discussion or as an exit ticket to help the students think about what they’ve learned.

This image shows a variety of pages included within the Graphic Novel Scavenger Hunt. — Graphic Novel Scavenger Hunt

I think your students will love playing this scavenger hunt, so I’ve made it available individually and as part of a Lemoncello bundle.

Do you use graphic novels in your classroom? Do you teach the vocabulary and unique elements? Let me know in the comments and I’ll give away one scavenger hunt on December 4! Enter through the rafflecopter here.

It’s Time for a TpT Winter Sale & Giveaway!

February 4, 2023 by Amy 2 Comments

Here are some resources that may fit that seasonal need for you in the coming weeks:

Get ready to *Soar* with this fantastic middle-grade novel by Joan Bauer.

Joan Bauer’s Soar is the perfect middle-grade novel for book clubs, book choice, a read aloud, or a whole-class pick in the spring. With baseball as the vehicle that moves the story along, this story deals with surprisingly deep topics, and this resource will help you flesh those out in appropriate ways – and how to discuss the humor that keeps the mood light. This bundle will save you money will providing everything you need no matter how you choice to use it in your classroom: discussion and writing questions, creative writing prompts, and novel study activities in a wide variety of subject areas.

Since spring is the time for wedding planning, I have to share this newish resource there – and because my students loved it! Create a Wedding Album for Romeo and Juliet is a digital resource designed to help your students do just that. It makes the perfect summative project, but your students could also work on it as you read the play, and it can be done individually or cooperatively. It’s very open-ended, so you have lots of room to make the assignment what you want it to be – but there’s enough here for your students to be super creative and demonstrate their understanding of the play while giving you some room to breath.

There you have it! These are my top resource recommendations for the upcoming weeks. What do you need to help your spring go smoothly?

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Here’s How to Make the Most of Mr. Lemoncello’s Very First Game

May 22, 2022 by Amy Leave a Comment

Mr. Lemoncello’s Very First Game by Chris Grabenstein just released, and it’s fantabulous! It’s the kind of story that everyone should read: it’s exciting, it’s full of adventure, and there are all sorts of character lessons and discussion opportunities tied up with the puzzles and riddles and problems of the story. That means that it’s a wonderful book to hand to your child, and you can feel confident that they’re reading an exciting but age-appropriate read.

You could go a step further, though. You could make this a class or family read-aloud, a book club book, or a choice for literature circles – and then you could dig deep into all of those exciting topics and character-building moments together. You could have groups debating the issues and exploring how Grabenstein used this book to set up the man that Luigi L. Lemoncello would later become.

Get your reading and writing guide for *Mr. Lemoncello’s Very First Game* here!

I want to help you make the most of all the excitement and energy and wisdom found in Mr. Lemoncello’s Very First Game! That’s why I’ve created a reading guide, full of discussion questions, short essays, vocabulary lists, and creative writing prompts of all sorts – so that you can just enjoy having fun with the story with your kids.

I have more ideas, though, so stay tuned for more Lemoncello fun to come!

Want to know more about what makes this book so special? Read my full review here!

With whom do you enjoy wonderful books? Let me know in the comments below – and if you’ve read Mr. Lemoncello’s Very First Game, I’d love to hear your thoughts.

Teachers, You Are Appreciated – Sale + Giveaway

May 1, 2022 by Amy 2 Comments

Teachers are the best – we all know it, right? I’m here to make sure you feel it, too! As we head into the last days of school with all the craziness that entails, know that you’re seen … and heard … and appreciated.

That’s why I’m participating in TpT’s Teacher Appreciation Sale happening on Tuesday, May 3, through Wednesday, May 4. With the code THANKYOU22 you can save up to 25% on everything you buy.

These fun but educational resources might help you out:

Linked by Gordon Korman is excellent for putting historical context to the Holocaust – and also for discussing forgiveness, tolerance, and redemption. This printable resource has more than 100 questions for discussion, essay, and short answer, all sorted by chapter. It also features creative writing prompts in a variety of formats and rubrics for grading. This is perfect for book clubs, literature circles, co-ops, and whole classes.

Get ready for some Lemoncello fun with this bundle.

Did you know that Chris Grabenstein is releasing a new Mr. Lemoncello book next month – the prequel story that put Luigi L. Lemoncello on his path to fame and gamemaker stardom? I’ve had the chance to read it – and it’s amazing! Get ready to have some Lemoncello-flavored fun with the book that started it all with these hands-on resources.

Encourage critical and creative thinking with these mock trials.

My kids love doing mock trials, and I love seeing how excited they get about doing them – and how hard they work to play their role well! Pulling that off requires lots of creative and critical thinking, and these types of activities inspire both – as well as teamwork and a bit of friendly competition. This bundle includes both a print and digital version of my bestselling Three Little Pigs resource, with everything you need to hold this mock trial in either format.

BUT WAIT! THERE’S MORE!

I’m giving away a $10 TpT gift card to help you make the most of your purchases next week. Enter via the rafflecopter below. Good luck!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Teachers, Redeem Your Time with #Homestretch Savings!

April 10, 2022 by Amy Leave a Comment

I don’t know about you, but life is hard right now – we have grad classes, college classes, high school classes, work, and family life all to juggle right now, and that’s a lot. Whatever your lot is, I know that it can be hard, but … teachers, we’re in the homestretch! The end (of the school year) is in sight, and a break is on the horizon.

That’s why I’m participating in the #Homestretch sale on Monday, April 11 – Tuesday, April 12. Search the hashtag #Homestretch on TpT and find hundreds of resources priced at only $1 – all chosen to help you push through these last few weeks.

I’ve chosen these two resources to share with you:

Save big with these book projects for Chris Grabenstein’s *Shine*!

Chris Grabenstein’s Shine is a winner of a book – and it’s message of appreciating the best in everyone is a real winner, too. These hands-on book projects were designed to allow kids to shine in their own ways, whether on their own or in groups of any size. There’s a wide variety of activities included, so your kiddos can be creative and show off their understanding of this story in their own way.

Hexagonal Thinking is a great way to help your students analyze literature.

I love hands-on learning, and it can be a great way to help students focus – especially during these cabin fever last weeks of school! This hexagonal thinking resource can be used with any novel. It’s editable, printable, and can be used with a very wide range of students – and it can be used again and again.

I hope that these resources – and this #homestretch event – can help you find the inspiration you need to finish this year strong.

Good luck and happy shopping!

Enter to Win & Make Teaching Easier This Spring

March 31, 2022 by Amy 1 Comment

Teaching through the pandemic days and the aftermath isn’t easy. Combine that with spring fever and Easter candy and … whew! That’s why I’m giving away a $10 TpT gift card just in time to use it in next week’s sale. One lucky winner will have this code in hand to get $10 off any purchase!

TpT’s Special Spring Sale will run April 5-6. You can save up to 25% off your purchases with the code FORYOU22.

Everything at A Nest in the Rocks will be on sale! Here are some resources that may be particularly timely at this time of year:

So there you have it – my favorite spring resources. What are you teaching this spring?

Don’t forget to enter to win at the rafflecopter below!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

How to Take Positive Action: Get Linked with Ukraine

March 1, 2022 by Amy Leave a Comment

The news is scary these days, isn’t it? It feels like there’s never anything good happening, and while the headlines have been reading like something out of a Jumanji game for a few years now, everything got so much worse last week when Russia targeted Ukraine.

I don’t typically pay much attention to politics, but I’m a mom who loves history – and invasions by huge countries and nuclear threats don’t bode well for world peace. I don’t want my future grandchildren to ask what I did – I want to do whatever I can, even if that’s not much, because something is better than nothing.

That’s why I want to get Linked with the citizens of Ukraine. Linked is the newest book by Gordon Korman and the subject of my latest TpT product – and it’s about understanding how everyone is linked by hate, love, and events. In the spirit of this book, which hopes to eradicate hate, I’m sending all of my proceeds from this resource from the month of March to a non-profit, charitable organization supporting Ukrainians. Go here to see my Discussion Questions and Creative Writing Prompts for Linked or search #TeachForPeaceUA to find all of the resources offered through this initiative.

Get Linked and aid the citizens of Ukraine during March 2022.

“Do all the good you can, by all the means you can, in all the ways you can, in all the places you can, at all the times you can, to all the people you can, as long as ever you can. ~ John Wesley

If we work together, we can hit a lot more of those than by working individually. Follow my FB page here to find out how much we’re sending in aid.