Send Them Off For The Summer with a School’s Out Freebie and Summer Review Packet

The end of the school year is quickly approaching in Michigan.  I’m scrambling to complete all those last-minute projects on top of assessing, scheduling a couple of walking field trips and planning our annual kindergarten field day. What better time to offer a time-saving freebie for all my teacher friends?  One of my biggest projects each year is gathering a small send off gift to accompany my students’ ‘First Grade Here I Come‘ summer review packet that I send home at the beginning of the break.

This packet contains over 110 pages of printable math, reading, phonics and other activities that give my students the opportunity to practice skills they already mastered during kindergarten.

Studies show that kindergarteners lose an average of 35% of the skills they mastered during the weeks of summer vacation.  If I can offer parents some help in minimizing that loss, I am definitely gonna try.  This packet does just that, and I always offer my students a bit of an incentive to go with it.  If they complete it and return it to me in the fall, I will have a small toy, trinket or even the chance to have lunch back in their ‘old’ kindergarten room with their ‘old’ kindergarten teacher. (Ok so maybe that part is more for me than them.  I miss them in the fall, and this gives me a chance to have them back for a lunch date!)

But, of course, in addition to their Summer Packet, I also want to give them a little fun ‘something’ to kick of the summer break.  So when I was thinking about what kind of small send off gift I could create for my kinders as they headed off to fun in the sun, I knew it had to be quick, easy, inexpensive . . . but most importantly, FUN!!!  Who better to help me meet all those criteria then my favorite paper pros at ASTROBRIGHTS® Papers.

A special thank you goes to ASTROBRIGHTS® Papers for partnering with me on this blog post. I received payment, trade, and or products from ASTROBRIGHTS® Papers in exchange for promoting. However, all opinions stated are my own and I only promote brands and products that I use and love. This post may also contains affiliate links. I receive a small commission each time someone makes a purchase through one of my links

Inspiration and my grand idea for this project came as I was walking through Target’s party section on a miniature eraser scavenger hunt.  (I know you all have been scoping out the Dollar Shelves just like me!)  On one of my trips, these  bright and beautiful kazoos caught my eye.  And listen to this . . . they were only about $6.00 for 12.

Can you believe those colors?  They are gorgeous and bright, and I had to have them.

All I needed was some colorful little cards made from my favorite Astrobrights colors, a few glue dots, and I was ready to get to work.

It wasn’t easy to pick just one color so I selected a variety of cardstock colors.  They just happened to match the colorful kazoos perfectly.

The hues that were most closely matched and that really gave my little kazoos the platform they needed to POP were:  Terrestrial Teal™, Vulcan Green™, Celestial Blue®, Re-Entry Red™, Lift Off Lemon™, Pulsar Pink™ and Cosmic Orange™.

To make your own send off gifts, all you need to do is print off the free ‘Make some noise . . .’ gift tags, add a little glue dots to the back of your kazoos and match them up to a coordinating colored tag.

Now combine that bright, little tag with the “First Grade Here I Come” packet, and you have the perfect send off gift for your kindergarten friends! I will warn you though, it might be helpful for you to demonstrate for your ‘friends’ the actual way to play a kazoo.  Believe it or not, there are plenty of folks that have never mastered the correct technique. If they pick it up and it doesn’t make the expected sound, you may want to refer to this post for some hints on the proper technique that you can share.

If you’d like to find out more about this “First Grade Here I” Come packet, click on THIS BLOG POST or the picture below to get a thorough description of all the activities and printables included.

And, of course, if you’d like to grab the ‘Make Some Noise . . .’ freebie for your own students, just click on the link below.  Once you fill out your email address and confirm your subscription to my blog, the file with automatically be sent to your ‘download’ file on your computer.  You can find it there.