What's up, Doc? Carrot Contractions!

Going through my homeschool closet today, I came across one of my youngest child's favourite games.  It's called Carrot Contractions.  Inspired a few years years ago by our favourite carrot loving cartoon bunny, this game pairs contractions, paper carrots, and a brown shoebox for fun with a Montessori flare. 

Learners practice reading 32 pairs of contractions and/or matching up the words to the contractions. So on one carrot you may have 'has not' and 'hasn't'.  If you pulled a carrot with a worm on it, it may only have 'has not' and the child would have to supply the 'hasn 't' contraction.  I couldn't believe what a great game this turned out to be for my kiddos. 

Assembly takes just a bit of effort, but it is so worth it.  Print out and prepare carrots and word pairs by cutting out the shapes and gluing the word to the white back of the carrot.   Kiddos pick carrots and read word sets. Carrots with a worm provide only one side of the contraction set, providing challenging fun. Alternate methods and challenge levels for game provided.

For real fun, laminate the carrots up and have the learner pull them from the ground -a brown cardboard box with a slit in it.  The plain brown craft shoe boxes from your local craft store work very well.  (The brown, of course, represents the dirt that carrot is growing in.)  Use an exacto to cut thin slits in the cover of the box.  Poke carrots into the box so that the tops are showing.  It makes the game so much more fun.  Alternately you could pull them out of a brown paper grocery bag as well.


Click Here to download Carrot Contractions now.

Hope you have fun as you get ready to head back to formal learning shortly - if you haven't already!! :)

Blessings,
Kalei