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Seriously FUN Ways to Teach Shapes!

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Shapes and geometry… two of my favorite math units to teach.  There are so many creative ways to teach about shapes, and let’s face it, it’s a whole lot more FUN than teaching primary students to unbundle, decompose, regroup, and subtract across zeros!

Seriously FUN Ways to Teach Shapes!- 2D and 3D shapes activities your students will love!
These are a few of my favorite high engagement, seriously FUN ways to teach about shapes!

 Connect Shapes to Popular Culture

Students relate and respond when learning is connected  to movies, books, and songs they love! They can’t help  but to get up and move to What Does the Fox Say? especially when you change the words to What does the SHAPE say!

Seriously FUN Ways to Teach Shapes~Get your dance moves on!

Use this kid-friendly Just Dance version  on YouTube to introduce your unit.

Make A Shapes Anchor Chart

Create a What Does the SHAPE Say? chart that serves as a lesson visual AND a game board. Use 2D or 3D shapes to make your lesson come alive!

Seriously FUN Ways to Teach Shapes!- 2D and 3D shapes activities your students will love!

Play a version of I Have, Who Has for students to identify shapes and their attributes.

 

Seriously FUN Ways to Teach Shapes!- 2D and 3D shapes activities your students will love!
Seriously FUN Ways to Teach Shapes! What Does the SHAPE Say? anchor chart/game board Around the Kampfire
Turn each piece into a removeable sticky note by using a repositionable glue stick!
Seriously FUN Ways to Teach Shapes! What Does the SHAPE Say? anchor chart/game board for teaching 2D & 3D shapes

 

Include Shapes Read Alouds

These are just a few of the read alouds I use and books I like to have available for students to read.
Favorite Books For Teaching About Shapes
The Perfect Square by Michael Hall is one of my very favorites. All of his books are treasures!
Use my affiliate links to find the books on Amazon:

 

Make Assessing Shapes Fun!

Use these shape booklets for students to describe the attributes of  2D or 3D shapes from the shape’s point of view.
What Does the SHAPE Say? attribute booklets
What Does the SHAPE Say? attribute booklets
 It’s also a great opportunity for students to apply their math vocabulary as they “speak” for each shape.
Seriously FUN Ways to Teach Shapes! 2D & 3D shapes activities with What Does the SHAPE Say? attribute booklets

Incorporate Writing About Shapes

Most teachers incorporate writing into every subject through journals, writing centers, and various  response activities. Here’s a high engagement math craft to step outside the journal and have students show what they know while practicing the correct use of quotation marks.
What does the SHAPE say? math craft
What does the SHAPE say? math craft

 

What does the SHAPE say? math craft

Animate Your Shapes Crafts!

Use the  ChatterPix app to give a voice to your learning!  It’s so simple to use and literally takes seconds to complete.
How to animate your crafts with ChatterPix
Each child takes a picture of their work using the app on an  iPad then follows these simple steps to record their voice.
How to animate your crafts with ChatterPix
Sometimes all it takes is a little talking mouth to send the engagement factor SOARING!

Make A Shapes Movie!

We took it a step further and made our very own movie!
What Does the Shape Say? movie~Using ChatterPix and iMovie to give a voice to your learning!
I saved each student’s work in Dropbox then uploaded  them into iMovie. You can then add a title and select from  their music library or add your own song.  Of course we  added the karaoke version of  What Does the Fox Say?  that I purchased on iTunes.

Munch On 2D Shapes During Math Class!

Incorporate edible activities during your shapes unit. Use crackers for plane shape sorting by number of sides  and vertices then use this Free Munchie Math Printable for students to identify the name and attributes of shapes.
 Fun ways to teach shapes! Free munchie math shapes printable.
Check the dollar store first when shopping for crackers.  They almost always have all the shapes you’ll need.

Quote Your Quadrilaterals!

We did some quadrilateral quotations at the start of our unit. This no prep activity is a lot of fun! Students draw a quadrilateral and add some wiggly eyes.  They then use quotation marks correctly to quote the quadrilateral!

 

Fun ways to teach shapes! Quadrilateral quotations are always a hit!
Fun ways to teach shapes! Quadrilateral quotations are always a hit!

Incorporate A Shapes STEM Challenge

This STEM project from creeksidelearning.com is a great addition to your shape activities. Challenge your students to experiment with shapes to determine which is the strongest.
Shapes STEM Challenge by CreeksideLearning.com

I hope you’ve found some ideas you can use in your classroom while teaching about shapes. Be sure to follow by email below so you won’t miss a post!  For more classroom ideas & inspiration you can find me onFind more information and a video of the experiment on creeksidelearning.com.

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Comments

  3. Linda says

    I'm so glad you like it Denise! We had a blast with it and the possibilities are endless for what you can do with ChatterPix in the classrooom!

    Reply

  8. Michelle A Ebers says

    I love this…I did it with my kidos and they were amazed. I have 1 question how did you put all your ChaterPix videos together with the background music? I’d like to present it to our PTO.

    Reply

    • Linda says

      Hi Michelle,
      I’m so glad your class loved it! It is a blast for sure! To make our video, I saved all of the MP4s my kids made in ChatterPix to the camera roll on my iPad. I then uploaded all of those into iMovie. There, you can type in your title and either choose music from their library or go to iTunes and get music. It’s been a while since we made ours, but I think I purchased my music from iTunes. I used an instrumental version of What Does The Fox Say? You can then upload your music to iMove and that’s it!
      I hope this helps and that your class loves their movie. I think we must have watched ours a bazillion times! They loved it as a brain break and would dance to it!

      Thanks so much for asking!

      Linda

      Reply

    • Linda says

      Hi Michelle,
      We put them all together using iMovie. You can choose music from the iMovie library to add to your video. I hope this helps!

      Reply

  9. Noelle says

    Hi Linda!

    I love how you did the Quote the Quadrilaterals activity! Can you give more detailed instructions on how you did that project? I was trying to figure out if there was paint involved or a certain kind of paint to make the shapes look the way they do.

    Thanks!

    Reply

    • Linda says

      Hi Noelle!
      The quadrilaterals writing was super easy to do. Students used a black marker to draw a quadrilateral on construction paper. They cut those out and glued them on to another sheet of construction paper then drew hands and feet on the shapes. We added some wiggly eyes and that’s it! I drew a speech bubble, copied it and students used that to write their quotes.

      I hope this helps and your class has fun making quadrilateral quotes! Thanks so much for stopping by and for asking!
      Linda

      Reply

  10. Angela says

    Wow! What a fun, exciting, and great way to help students learn. Hank you so much for sharing! I can’t wait to try it myself next school year!

    Reply

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