About This Daily Classroom Special 
Each week Homework Hotline will suggest homework assignments aimed at grades K-1 and 2-3. Homework Hotline was written by Buzz Eyler, Director of Educational Technology at the Orcutt School District ( CA) and a former Teachers Network web mentor. 

To the Homework Hotline Directory

Newspaper Activities

This week the homework will center on newspaper activities. The activities are appropriate for K-3, except as noted. Feel free to copy, cut, and paste the assignments into your own word processor for sending home (or print this page).

Day 1

Have the children look through a newspaper and find numbers as listed below. Glue as many of these numbers as they can on a piece of 8 1/2 by 11 paper. For kindergarteners, look for numbers from 1 - 20; for first, numbers from 20 - 100; for second, any numbers which are in money notation; and for third, number words or numbers over 1000.

Day 2

Have each child bring in the weather forecast for tomorrow for his/her town. For second and third grade, they must also find a town that will be colder and a town that will be warmer tomorrow.

Day 3

Give each child a piece of writing paper to take home. They are to search through the paper for an unusual picture, cut it out and glue it to the top of the writing page. Bring it to school tomorrow, collect them and randomly distribute for a writing exercise such as "Tell something about this picture." K and first need only tell a story about the pictures.

Day 4

Ask the children to look through the paper and find 10 words which fit the categories listed below. Write them on a piece of paper and return to school tomorrow. First, second and third graders should be ready to read their words. Here are the categories: kindergarten - words which start with (give them a letter that you are studying such as 'm'; first - words that are one to five letters long; second - words which have capital letters at the beginning; third - words that show action (verbs).