Activities by Grade

Draw three circles the size of dinner plates on your paper.  Using the newspaper, cut out foods you would eat for breakfast, lunch and dinner plates.  Paste the foods you have cut out onto your breakfast, lunch and dinner plates.

Some people live where it is warm all year long.  They live in a warm climate.  Cut out four pictures of clothes you would wear in this warm place.  Now, cut out four pictures of clothes you would not wear in this warm place.  Write a sentence about why you would not like to live in a warm climate.

Look at the food ads.  Find the names of eight things you can eat or drink.  Cut these names or items out of the newspaper and paste them into one of each of eight boxes you have drawn on a piece of paper.  Put a happy face on your favorite food.

Can you find the shapes? Cut out five pictures from a newspaper.  Paste these pictures onto a piece of paper.  In each picture, see if you can find: squares, triangles, rectangles, circles, or ovals.  Use a crayon to go over any shapes you may find.

Find and clip numbers of the same size in the newspaper and paste them to a paper plate to make the face of a clock.  Can you find any examples of numbers used to tell time in the newspaper?

Find the comics section in the index of your newspaper.  Turn to the comics and cut out two cartoons.  Paste the cartoons on paper and erase the words.  Write your own words in the balloons.  Have a friend read your cartoon.

Find pictures of transportation and cut them out.  Paste them on paper and label each picture.  Can you think of any other kind of transportation?  If so, list them and draw pictures of them.

As part of a lesson on safety, clip 10 newspaper pictures of things that can be dangerous such as: scissors, knives, ropes, power tools, etc.

Look through the newspaper and cut out as many words as you can find that describe size.  Paste these onto your paper.

Look through the newspaper and find one example of a long vowel and a short vowel sound for each of the five vowels.  Clip these words from the newspaper and paste them onto your paper.

Find five pictures of things that cause pollution.  Cut them out and paste them on your paper.  Write two or more sentences on how you can stop pollution.  Can you label each kind of pollution you have found?

Choose a newspaper article in the paper and paste onto your paper.  Now circle all the different punctuation marks used in the story.  Make a list of each of the punctuation marks used.

Who is the President of the United States?  Try to find a picture of the President in the newspaper.  Cut out any pictures of the President you find as well as the name of our President.  Paste these pictures onto your paper.

Find as many weather words as you can and clip them from the newspaper.  Illustrate or draw a picture for each word you have cut out.

Using the newspaper, cut out 10 words that have double vowels.  Paste these onto your newspaper.  Do the same for 10 words that have blends.

A noun is a name, person, place or thing.  Find 10 nouns on the front of the newspaper.  Write sentences for each.

Look through your newspaper and find 10 different ways numbers have been used.  Cut these out and paste them onto your paper.  Label each of the ways numbers have been used.

Turn to the sports section of the newspaper.  Clip from the paper all the synonyms for "win" and "lose" you can find.  Paste these onto a sheet of paper.

Choose two pictures in the newspaper showing emotion.  Cut these out and paste on your paper.  Now, describe the pictures using sound, smell, taste and feeling words.

Pick two stories on the front page of the newspaper.  Answer the following questions:  When did the story take place?  Where did the story take place?  What happened?  Who was involved?  Why is it newsworthy?

Find the lost and found column in the newspaper.  Choose one item that has been lost or found and write a short story about the item: how it was lost, who found it, where did they find it, etc.

Look through the newspaper and find the following:  five stories from cities outside of Jamestown still in New York, five stories from states other than New York, and five stories from countries other than the United States.  Write the names of these cities, states and countries down on your paper and page number you found them on in the newspaper.

Find and clip ten plural words in the newspaper.  Write the root word next to each of the plural words.

Using the newspaper, cut out advertisements or pictures from the paper that show the use of mathematics (example, a pair of shoes-size requires math.)  Cut out ten different advertisements or pictures and paste onto your paper.

Use a grocery ad from the newspaper.  Choose five items that you like to eat.  Cut them out of the paper along with the price and then add up the total cost for all the items.

Make a list of at least 15 descriptive words you find in the advertisements.  Compile a list, write two paragraphs describing something.  Use as many of the words as you can.

Using the paper, locate 10 different abbreviations.  What is an abbreviation?  Clip these out and write what they represent.

Look at the weather map in the newspaper.  Predict the weather for tomorrow in five different cities.

Choose five different headlines.  Rewrite each one as a complete sentence.  Put in correct punctuation.

Locate examples of three maps in the paper.  What information do these maps give and why are they in the paper?  Write your answer next to the maps you have clipped out and pasted on a sheet of paper.

What is an antonym?  Look through the newspaper and five different sets of autonyms.  Clip these words from the newspaper and paste onto your paper.

Look through the newspaper and find all the maps.  How many were you able to find?  Choose an article you have found in the paper and draw a map to illustrate that article.

Take a newspaper and find three stories or pictures about accidents.  Clip these stories/pictures out of the paper.  Paste onto a sheet of paper.  How could each of these accidents have been prevented.

Locate a newspaper article written in present tense and clip it out of the paper.  Underline all the verbs and then rewrite the article in the past tense.

Clip 10 adjectives from the advertising section of the newspaper, paste these onto your paper and beside each write one synonym and one antonym.

Scan through your newspaper and list 10 occupations which are discussed.  Don't use your classified advertisements for this activity!

Find a political cartoon in the newspaper that you consider timely and interesting.  Write a new caption for that cartoon.  Cut the cartoon out of the paper and paste it onto your paper along with the new caption you have written.

Select three apartments listed in the classified ads for rent.  Do the following for each of the apartments you have chosen: Compute the total rent for a year for each of the apartments.  Determine the average monthly rent base on the three apartments you have chosen.  Which of the three apartments appears to be the better choice for the money and why?

Plan a meal for a family of four.  Use the grocery ad to compute the cost of your meal.

Imagine that you are in charge of preparing a time capsule that will be opened 200 years from now.  Cut items from the newspaper that you think would tell the most about our lives today.  Put these items on your paper.

Pretend you are living in a society in which there are no newspapers.  Make a list of all the functions provided by the newspaper.

Make a chart showing examples of the vocabulary variations that appear in different sections of the newspaper.  For instance, common jargon used by the food editor and sports editor would probably be quite different.

An acronym is an abbreviation for a phrase and is formed from the first letters of each word in the phrase.  For example: GOP- Grand Old Party.  Look through the newspaper and find 10 examples of acronyms, clip them out of the newspaper and paste onto your sheet.  Write what it stands for.  

Find a least 10 examples in which another language has been used in advertisements or articles.  Determine if the word is a standard one in English, a borrowing, or simply a foreign word used for effect.

Find a newspaper article that is about each of the following and clip them out to paste onto another sheet of paper: a meeting of a government agency, a press conference, a disaster or unexpected happening.

Clip 10 pictures of news items from the paper to illustrate the various ways tax money is spent.  Paste these onto your paper.

Find newspaper examples of paragraphs written in present, past and future tense.  Be aware of paragraphs containing clumsy shifts in tense.  Clip your examples from the newspaper and paste them onto your paper.

Find the average cost of renting a 1, 2 and 3 bedroom luxury apartment for a month, a year and for five years.  List your reasons for classifying the apartments as "luxury" apartments.

Scan the front page of the paper and see how many phrases of attribution you find in the stories including such phrases as: he said... repeatedly... allegedly... and informed source... it is reported... according to... (underline the phrases as you locate them in the newspaper.)

Scan the datelines in the newspaper and circle those that are capital cities of either states or countries.  Clip these datelines from the newspaper and paste onto another sheet and list what state or country they are a capital of.

Collect five newspaper advertisements that encourage savings.  Put these onto your paper.  Answer the following questions: What ads encourage savings?  How do the ads encourage savings?  What ads only appear to encourage savings?  What are the hidden costs?

Choose an editorial on the editorial page of the newspaper.  Clip this and place it onto your paper.  Divide your paper into two columns, and on one side of the paper write down all the facts listed in the editorial and on the other side list all the opinions.

Look at the houses for sale in the classified ads.  Then do the following: Identify the section of the city in which you live.  Count the number of houses listed by area.  Name the section of the city which has the greatest number of listings and the least number of listings.  Name the area in which the homes are most expensive and least expensive.

Find two examples of each of the four kinds of sentences; interrogative, declarative, exclamatory, imperative.  Clip and paste onto your paper.

Using the newspaper, collect advertisements for products that were not available 20 years ago.  Can you identify the scientific advances that have made this new product possible?

Read the "Help Wanted" ads and find a job that lists a salary and calculate the following: hourly wage, daily wage, weekly wage, monthly wage, annual wage and wages over a three year period.

Find examples of editorials that were written to: inform the reader, interpret the news for the reader, entertain the reader, and influence the reader.

After scanning the newspaper, choose five news articles and write new headlines for the articles.  After writing new headlines, write new "leads" to the news story that begin with different types of grammatical constructions, such as a prepositional phrase, a noun clause, etc.