Category Archives: Uncategorized

Zahlen / Numbers

Posted in Coloring Pages, Numbers, Pre-K & K Class, Uncategorized by

We practice counting right from the start in Pre-K/Kindergarten classes! I thought I would collect a number of resources that I hand out at the beginning of the year.

Here is a video I made for counting to 12. In the video, I count farm animals. However, we don’t start learning those words until the spring. So you might want to watch for just about 1 minute 20 seconds 🙂

I have a variety of coloring pages, including some color-by-number, and even tracing pages for early readers. Scroll through to see the selection! The PDF download links are below each image.

Counting fish, numbers 1-5:

Fünf kleine Fische – GitADownload

And here are 5 mice that go nicely with the finger play, Die Mausfamilie (The Mouse Family).

Zahlen 1-5 Mäuse – GitADownload

Or there are 10 mice!

Zahlen 1-10 Mäuse – GitADownload

Fall Color-by-number:

Malen nach Zahlen Herbstblatt – GitADownload

Tracing Number Words:

Trace number words in German 1-10 – GitADownload

That’s all for now! Check back for updates throughout the year!

Fünf kleine Fische / Five Little Fish

Posted in Book Materials, Books, Coloring Pages, Pre-K & K Class, Songs, Uncategorized by

In the fall, I love to read the books about Kleiner weißer Fisch (Little White Fish) by Guido van Genechten. They are sweet books that are perfect for early language learners. There is a whole series of the books, so we read 5 of them this year in Pre-k/Kindergarten.

To go along with the books, we also sing the song “Fünf kleine Fische”. The kids love it! They especially love the “blub blub blub” part. I have little hand motions that we do with the song, so the kids can play along, even before they have learned the words. Here is a video of how I sing the song with them:

Of course, we practice counting to 5 before we start singing! We count forward and backward, since the song starts with 5 fish and counts down to 1.

To go along with the song, I have a coloring page that also includes the lyrics to the song with an English translation:

You can download that PDF for FREE here:

Funf kleine Fische – Songtext GitADownload

I also have a simple coloring page of five fish. This coloring sheet includes the words to the song as well.

You can download the PDF for FREE here:

funf-kleine-fische-gitaDownload

Finally, if you are musically inclined and would like the sheet music for the song, you can find it here from Sing Kinderlieder (PDF).

Viel Spaß beim Singen!

Alles über den Igel, Teil 2 (All about the Hedgehog, Part 2)

Posted in 1st - 4th Grade, Coloring Pages, German Culture, Uncategorized by

I have been working hard to create the rest of the pages for our unit on hedgehogs in 1st & 2nd grade. And I think they are finally finished!

I made two different cover pages. I think I will use the simple one and give instructions in German on which colors to color each element:

  • Die Stacheln des Igels sind dunkelbraun.
  • Das Körper und das Gesicht des Igels sind hellbraun.
  • Die Eule ist grau.
  • Der Pilz ist lila.
  • Das Blatt oben ist rot.
  • Das Blatt in der Mitte ist orange.
  • Das Blatt unten ist gelb.

We will do the cover page on the last day of the unit. There are three other pages (Habitat, Feinde, Essen). We will do one page per week.

The entire hedgehog unit will take us 6 weeks to complete. (We’ve already labeled the body parts and talked about where in the world hedgehogs live.)

Each week I also show the children an adorable picture of Mr. Herbee, the Hedgehog. Do you know him? He’s an Instagram sensation! He is the second hedgehog pet of a woman in Wiesbaden. The kids just love seeing his happy little face every week!

Download the PDF file of these worksheets here:

Mein Wissensbuch über den Igel GitADownload

Answer sheets are included in the PDF file!

(Note that the program I used to make the worksheets creates for A4 paper. Just make sure you tell your printer to fit to letter size, if you are printing in the US!)

Alles über den Igel (All about the Hedgehog)

Posted in 1st - 4th Grade, Uncategorized by

For our first lesson on the hedgehog in 1st & 2nd grade, I found a simple labeling project for the kids. I got it from Zaubereinmaleins.

I decided to leave mine as a full page, since I’m only using one of her pages from this Igelheft. Before we did the labeling, we reviewed some body parts in German and then sang “Kopf, Schulter, Knie und Fuß“. It was a nice opportunity to get the kids moving, too.

Next week, I want to talk about where in the world you can find hedgehogs. As I mentioned in my last post, they are the most common mammals in Germany. Yet they are not indigenous to North America! So I created a worksheet for the kids to label on which continents hedgehogs live. I decided my first version was too difficult for little hands to color, so I ended up making two versions. One where they just color the matching box to “check it off” and one where they could color in the continents.

For the second worksheet, the kids can just check off the continents. Or they can also color them in. They could even be challenged first to see if they can color in Germany in a different color.

I found this image on Junior.de to use as my guide:

You can download the PDF of the worksheet here:

Wo wohnt der IgelDownload

Our next hedgehog lesson will be about the habitat of the hedgehog. Stay tuned!

Apfelstrudel – Apple Strudel

Posted in 1st - 4th Grade, Baking & Cooking, Recipes, Uncategorized by

Here is another language lesson in the form of a recipe! Today we are baking Apfelstrudel.

Here is the video, and below is a link to download the recipe in German & English.

Here is the PDF for the recipe:

Apfelstrudel Rezept GitADownload

Guten Appetit!

I created a couple of worksheets as follow-up activities, in case students are not able to back the strudel. The information needed to complete each of the worksheets can be found in the video. You can download them here.

There is a crossword puzzle:

Apfelstrudel Kreuzworträtsel GitADownload

And there is a short geography worksheet:

Geography GitADownload

Lebkuchenherz basteln / Gingerbread heart craft

Posted in 1st - 4th Grade, Crafty Projects, Holidays, Uncategorized, Videos by

I wanted to offer my students a craft that they could do at home, no matter what kinds of craft supplies they have. But of course it had to be something German, too! So I thought about making a gingerbread heart out of paper. The kids can decorate it with whatever they have at home. Maybe they will even give it to someone special!

I always think of gingerbread hearts at Christmas markets. All those colorful, decorated hearts hanging from one of the stalls! And what a treat when someone gives you one with a special message!

Aachener Weihnachtsmarkt, 2019

Here is a link to the video instructions:

You can download the free PDF with bilingual instructions as well as templates. There are two heart templates. One has decoration on it, and one is plain.

Lebkuchenherz basteln GitADownload

Interactive German Bingo Board

Posted in 1st - 4th Grade, Games, Projects, Uncategorized by

I have been thinking a lot about my students and how they are coping with home learning. It is such a challenging situation. My own kids are in 1st & 4th grade, so I know what is being asked of my elementary German students. We have good days and bad days. Mostly my kiddos get their class work done, but it’s usually too much to ask them to do the specials work, too.

So I wanted to create something that would add an element of fun to my German lessons. And I wanted to be able to let the students CHOOSE. I had been sending out lessons each week with 3 or 4 options. But that gets overwhelming. So I started thinking about making a bingo board! Then I just happened to see a blog post on how to make a choice board, and I knew this is what I was going to do!

As the instructions told me, I created the board in Google Slides. Then I started adding one slide per activity. I already had many of the activities prepared, so I just had to write them up and create the links. Here is what the main board looks like:

Bingo Board 2020 Complete

I’m sorry I can’t share the actual board. However some of the files are private or copyrighted. But here are a few of the slides:

There are 16 activities in all. I had started with 25, but then I realized we only have a few more weeks of school! So I made it smaller. The activities in order from left to right, starting at the top, are:

  • Learn the song/dance “Fliegerlied”
  • Learn some sports and complete a crossword puzzle or word search
  • Sing “Mein Hut, der hat drei Ecken” (read more about this from our class here!)
  • Elefant und Schweinchen: Du hast einen Vogel auf dem Kopf
  • Elefant und Schweinchen: Kommst du raus zum Spielen?
  • Basteln – Lebkuchenherz: Make a paper gingerbread heart (see this post!)
  • Make Pfannkuchen (see this post!)
  • Watch Peppa Wutz (learn to draw Peppa in this post!)
  • Learn a dance from Dance Company Leipzig (you can find them in YouTube!)
  • Make a secret message (here is the video! – Danke, Kathrin!!)
  • Elefant und Schweinchen: Das Buch über uns
  • Watch a Story Listening Fairy Tale (all on my YouTube Channel: German in the Afternoon!)
  • Watch a Story Listening Story (also on my YouTube Channel: German in the Afternoon)
  • Elefant und Schweinchen: Muss ich was abgeben?
  • Make Apfelstrudel (see this post!)
  • Yoga auf Deutsch (see this post!)

I’m so excited for this project! I had such fun putting it together. I hope my students will be inspired. If they don’t get to the activities now, I’m wondering if they might try doing some of them after school is officially over for the year?? We are still homebound in our area, so I imagine kids – and parents – will be looking for things to do!

Learn to Draw Peppa Wutz/Pig in German!

Posted in 1st - 4th Grade, Uncategorized, Videos by

As one of my Bingo lessons for my 3rd & 4th graders, I had them watch an episode of Peppa Wutz (Peppa Pig) in German. The episode is called “Sportfest” (Sports Day).

After watching, one of their options is to draw Peppa. I created my own video in German to help them do it!

 

Once they have finished drawing Peppa, I asked them to label at least 3 body parts.

  • Kopf
  • 2 Ohren
  • Schnauze
  • 2 Augen
  • Mund / Lächeln
  • Wange
  • Kleid
  • 2 Arme
  • 2 Hände
  • 3 Finger
  • 2 Beine
  • 2 Füße

Have fun drawing Peppa with me!

Pfannkuchen! – German Pancakes

Posted in 1st - 4th Grade, Baking & Cooking, Recipes, Uncategorized by

I’m branching out into new territory with my online lessons. This week I made a recipe video on how to make German Pancakes – Pfannkuchen!

It’s not perfect. I won’t be changing careers to a video editor any time soon 🙂 But I did have fun putting it together!

Here is the video. Below is the recipe that you can download. It has all the information in German and English. Guten Appetit!

 

Here is the recipe: Rezept Pfannkuchen GitA

Bauernhoftierpuppen – Farm Animal Puppets

Posted in 1st - 4th Grade, Crafty Projects, Pre-K & K Class, Uncategorized by

As I was preparing this week’s lesson on farm animals, I came up with the idea of having the children make puppets with the farm animals. It’s simple enough! Download the PDF, color and label the animals. Then cut them out and glue them to craft sticks!

Download the PDF here: Bauernhoftierepuppen GitA

Let me know how they turn out!

Bauernhoftierepuppen-page-001