[kyteacher]

I am hoping to offer several Family Projects for students to work on with their families at home. I was thinking of doing an All About Me & My Family Project for the first one. Does anyone have suggestions on how to do this or experience with doing this type thing?

I would also love to have ideas of other seasonal type projects to do as Family Projects!!! Thanks so much!

[Linda]

I send a letter at the beginning of the year telling the parents what family projects will be. Then I send a letter with details about each project the month it is due. We try to do one a month. Ours is as follows:

September: Grandparent Interview
October: Timeline of the child's life
November: Family Turkey (We send home a paper turkey and they decorate it anyway they want)
December: Make an ornament for the class tree.
January: Junk Sculpture
Febraury: Famous Person Report
March: A recipe for the class cookbook
April: Earth Boxes
May: Ocean Animal Report

Hope this helps you!! I would love to hear what everyone else does!

[cariokie]

You can send home a blank cutout of a child. They decorate it to like like themselves and bring them back. We hang them on a bulletin board. Or you could give them a tree cutout and they make it into a family tree. I have also done teddy bears and soldiers at Christmas time for the 5 senses unit. Im sure we can think of one a month to do if we think about it.

[cariokie]

Do you have samples of your letters or more detailed expectations of each project? I love what you do! Thanks for sharing!

[NJ Teacher]

My students write a story with their families. I send home a letter explaining the project and a white "bare" book.Many of the families write memoirs, but some make up very creative stories. Students and their families can use the computer, or I provide a line guide for those handwriting theirs. They can illustrate it using any technique they want. The parents tell me that they have become family keepsakes.

[ncteachr]

I just posted a site that has ideas for take home bags for families to do together. The link is just a couple threads down.

[teach4fun]

I do a family quilt. I send home a 12 by 12 piece of tag board with instructions for the family to make it in to a square which will be part of a larger quilt to show we are all part of a bigger family. They are to put whatever they want to represent thier family just now alter the size or shape of the square. They can use photos, drawings, fabric, paint, words anything they as a family agree upon. It is amazing to see how it looks after it is all put together. I bought cheap ribbon at Michaels on sale and after hanging the squares I tack the ribbon along the edges and it looks just like a quilt. I love it and it is now a fixture of the hallway for each fall. I hope this helps.

[Rita1stGrade]

In November, my kids do a "Tom Turkey". They disguise Tom so nobody will know he is a turkey and won't eat him. It is hysterical!

[wadswob]

This sounds like a great idea. Do you send home a turkey blackline? How does this work??

[MP0863]

I love these ideas and the idea of getting families involved. I am not teaching yet, I am actually going to student teach this fall. Anyway, I was wondering how you deal with family projects with students whose families aren't really involved...how do you deal with it, and how do you go about dealing with the child and grading??