Well, after quite a blogging break, I am so happy to be back this week and so excited to share with you all my freebie today!
This month, we are focussing on both winter activities and Chinese New Year activities. So in the spirit of winter, I created these Penguin Cards. There are 20 different pairs of penguins on 40 individual playing cards. These cards are awesome because they can be used in so many different ways to target so many different skills. They also can be used for children as young as two, and up through the upper elementary years (or even higher if you work with middle school or high school children with more severe learning delays).
How to Prepare the Penguin Cards: You print out all four pages on thick card stock, and cut out the individual cards. Laminate them for durability. It is important that the card stock is think, so that the pictures do not show through to the other side (i.e. see-through). Two other options to solve this problem is to print on white paper, cut out and paste to a darker color card stock, then laminate, OR you could also print them out on sticker paper, cut them out, and stick them to card stock before laminating. (And, if you are not planning to use these over and over, you could get away with not laminating them!).
What Skills You Can Target: This is the best part…there are SO many possibilities! Here are a few:
- Same/Different
- Vocabulary
- Articulation
- Grammar/Syntax
- Basic Concepts
- Describing skills
- Asking “wh” questions
- Answering “wh” questions
How to Use the Penguin Cards: Again, there are SO many things you can do with these! Here are some ideas:
- Memory: Placing all cards face down on a table and taking turns trying to find matches
- “Go Fish” except rather that just asking for “the penguin” (because that just wouldn’t work, would it??) have your child/student describe the cards when trying to ask for a card. For example “Do you have the penguin who is holding the two bells?”
- “I Spy” Put out all the cards in front of you and play I Spy… “I spy a penguin ice skating” and then the first child who finds the card gets to keep it.
- Go Fishing:Place a paperclip on each card. Place the cards in a box and have the children use a fishing pole with a magnet on the end of the string (these can be bought at dollar stores or toy stores, or you can make one from dowel, string, and a magnet) to “fish” out cards. Have the children try to “fish” for the matching cards!
- Flashlight Hide and Seek: Hide the cards all over a room/house and have your child/children go “seek” for the cards…it’s more fun if you can make it a little dark and use flashlights! See who can find the most matching cards.
- Charades: Put the cards in a pile. Have the children pick a card and act out what the penguin is doing on the card. Some of these might be hard…so you could have the second set of cards displayed to help the guessers out.
- Pictionary: Put the cards in a pile. Have the children pick a card and draw what the penguin is doing in the picture.
- Twenty Questions: To help work on question asking, you can play a game of twenty questions. Separate the cards into two decks. Lay out one deck on a table, face up so you can see all the penguins. Then have the other deck in a pile. Have a child/student pick a penguin from the pile, and have the other child/children ask questions to try to determine which penguin the child is holding. The “askers” can use the penguin pictures on the table to help guide their questions, and if they are sure the person does not have a particular penguin, they can flip the card over (like in the Guess Who game).
I hope you enjoy this freebie! You can download these cards HERE. If you use these please let me know, I LOVE to hear feedback…especially other ideas on how to use things!
thanks for sharing!
You are welcome! Thanks for stopping by!
I love your penguin pics, but could not download them 🙁 Everytime I tried to click on the pdf link, it closed my program.
Mary, I am so sorry! I was able to download them on my laptop and iPad…you can email me and I can email them to you. Katie@playingwithwords365.com
Hi, I know you’ve received this award before, but I love your blog so much that I’m sending more love (and readers) to you by awarding you the Versatile Blogger Award again!
Stop by my blog to receive it! 🙂 http://blog.mybabyfootsteps.com/?p=1705
Ming THANK YOU!!!!! You rock!
Thanks so much! These are great!
You’re welcome! 😀
I also chose your blog for the Versatile Blogger Award!!!
http://wildaboutk.blogspot.com/
Kathy Thank you SO much! 😀
These games would be really great for my children who have speech IEPs. Thanks for sharing on Thinky Linky Thursday! Your freebies are awesome!!!
Lori @ Cachey Mama’s Classroom
Thanks Lori! Yes, they are GREAT for kids with language delays!
Thanks so much for sharing with everyone! Who wouldnt’ love a fun game with cute penguins!! Thanks for all the suggestions on how to use them too =-) Thanks for linking up to TGIF & have a GREAT week,
Beth =-)
Thanks Beth! 🙂
These are fantastic! Thanks for a great freebie, can’t wait to use them in February with my penguin unit 🙂
Lisa 🙂 (new follower)
Made In The Shade In Second Grade
You are welcome! So glad to have you here!
cute penguins – my youngest loves penguins (and memory), he will be excited to find these in his box!
Awesome! Let me knows hoe he enjoys them! 😀
How fun!! I love all the great things you can do with them. Thank you for sharing at Sharing Saturday!
Very cute … and I love that you gave so many game ideas, too! Thanks so much for sharing! I featured your penguin cards as my Free Printable of the Day at the Living Montessori Now Facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/LivingMontessoriNow
Katie,
These are great! I am a sped teacher. I am working on lieteracy bags for my students to take home and practice skills with their parents. One of my themes is penguins. Lots of my students have speech deficits. This is an excellent way to help parents build their speech skills at home. Thanks
Great!!! Thank you! I’m a French speech therapist and I will print it quickly to use it with my patients!
I’m linking your cards to a penguin unit study I’m doing for my new Preschool curriculum book! Thanks for sharing!
Fantastic!
Your cards are adorable, but I can not print them.
Have you first saved them to your own computer? Then print?
Thank you! I love all your great downloads. I’m a former first grade teacher turned stay-at-home mom, and I love doing the activities with my two-year-old daughter.
Aleah recently posted..{On the Menu:} Sweet & Sour Chicken
You are so welcome Aleah! 🙂
I was unable to download the penguin memorydescribing cards.
Can you elaborate? What happened when you clicked on the link?
Thank you so much for this Freebie. I appreciate any free things as I am in a classified position for Kindergarten and am trying to set up Centers around themes and this fits in perfectly for my Penguin activities and so versatile too!
Useful and cute penguin cards! I find your explanations and examples very helpful to use with parents. Telling about these strategies through another pair of eyes lets me more securely embed these skills in parents for their babies and toddlers. And yes bottom line is to have FUN with your little ones.
Sharon, Speech-Language Pathologist in CA,
with the past 16 years with Early Start out of 40 years of experience
I can’t install your resource. I get as far as ‘run’ and an exclamation mark pops up. This is a real shame as it looks good.
Hi Katie!
I am also having an issue with downloading the Freebie Friday Penguin theme! Could you please forward it to my email? Thank you so much 🙂
Happy Holidays!
Mikaela
Katie, I want to thank you for your wonderful resources. I am a SLPA and have used your resources and advice throughout the year. Keep up the excellent work