Brain Builders

A big focus of mine over the past few weeks has been to come up with a little something special for my "high" kids to do once they've completed zoomed through their work.  It amazes me how quickly they can finish their things!  I feel like I need to be assigning these firsties a research project!  **Which isn't a bad idea for our penguin unit!! 

I found this brilliant idea on Pinterest (where else!)  and got straight to work on my Brain Builders bulletin board.  **The blog the post comes from is Sunny Days in Second Grade.  Here you'll find a good explanation of what Brain Builder is all about.

 I got my Brain Builder board up and running in a weeks time.  I spent long hours at home and at school creating, printing, laminating, and cutting these fun little cards out. 

Here's what my new and improved bulletin board looks like:

**I only have 4 sets of cards up in this picture but I keep 8 up at one time.

With the task cards there is a quiz sheet that the students take once they've studied the cards enough and feel like they're ready for a quiz. You could run this as a buddy test or with an aide.   At this point in the year my littles are independent enough to work with a partner.   Upon completion and a score of 100%, the students will earn a "Brain Bead."  ** You can find a picture of the Brain Bead Braclets at Sunny Day's in Second Grade.  In my room, since space is an issue, I give students a Brain Bead Braclet & their first bead once they've completed their first test.

Although everyone is welcome to participate, this is geared towards my high kids.  I include task cards that are geared for both first grade and second grade. 

Here are a few of the task cards that I've created:

Click here to download Word Wizzard's -- Suffixes

Click here to download Math Magician's -- Clocks

Click here to download Sentence Sleuth's -- Sentence Types

I spent quite a long time "Google-ing" various sites to find pre-created task cards.  I found quite a few useful resources.  I'm type-A and recreate my my own versions of them and tweak them for my own liking but it would definitely be a time saver to use them as is!  Here are a few sites that I've found useful:

Cape 2nd Grade

Mrs. Ziruolo's Second Grade Class

Cape.k12.mo.us

Lastly, here's the answer sheet and directions found at Sunny Days in Second Grade. 

What do you do to challenge your advanced kiddos?