The HoarderRehab Blog: The Destiny of Things: Back to School Gum Ball Machine Capsules: The Destiny of Things, Story 306

Back to School Gum Ball Machine Capsules: The Destiny of Things, Story 306

A teacher story who uses them as fun writing prompts in the classroom!

50 or 100 empty gum ball vending machine capsules, available here

photo via HoarderRehab

Here is his email in hopes of inspiring many little future authors:

I am a second grade teacher and am constantly looking for ways to engage my students in creative writing. With all the academic writing we do, I worry that the joy and thrill of writing for pleasure gets lost on occasion. And so... my plan for these capsules:

In a small container in my classroom, each capsule will be filled with 1 random creative prompt. At various opportunities, students will have the chance to take one capsule and engage in a creative writing piece with the prompt inside, BUT they may only take one!

My hope is that with these little capsules and some quick, easy-to-start creative writing prompts, I can put a little more joy and excitement back into school writing!

Thanks for your products! :)

50 or 100 empty gum ball vending machine capsules, available here

photo via HoarderRehab

How fun and enticing that will be for a classroom full of second graders this fall! I remember when I was a teacher thinking up ways to make all kinds of different writing motivating and fun after all the mandatory daily academic writing assignments too!

Here are some of the ones my third graders enjoyed:

1. Since students sneak and write secret notes to each other anyway, we had "note" passing time in class. Depending on how much time we had in our daily academic schedule, it was like taking a 5 to 15 minute break and

it was time when "note passing" was allowed!

Everyone got a notepad like the one below and could pass notes to their heart"s content until the designated time of the timer went off! And let me assure you, it's a quiet break until the timer goes off and then there would be plenty of disappointing groans!

Just Say NO, lined memo pads, available here

photo via VintageToGoEasy

I would get plenty of notes of my own from students, especially shy students who would want to ask something, but not outloud.at this time. It was a good time to set an example for personal letter writing.

Which reminds me, the formal lesson to "Note Passing 101" was how to format and write business or personal letters, so we stayed within the academic boundaries!

We had many ways to take quick fun breaks in the classroom and this one was one of the more popular ones!

Wouldn't it had been more fun passing notes with these gum ball capsules?

50 or 100 empty gum ball vending machine capsules, available here

photo via HoarderRehab

There are others, but I'm running out of time here, so here is a short one I think would be fun using the gum ball capsules. The curriculum of third grade students at my school had to study the Five or More Senses for Science and I would mingle it with descriptive writing.

Wouldn't it be fun, if each student had to take an empty gum ball capsule and fill it with a tangible non edible favorite and then describe it in writing using their five senses for homework.

Then later the next day they randomly choose one after you've collected their homework or could trade it with someone else who did their homework and write their descriptions and then afterwards compare the similarities and differences of their writing descriptions.

If any teachers out there try this out, let me know how it goes!

If you need less than 50, they are in amounts of 20, 25, or 30 here

photo via HoarderRehab

Saying Goodbye: I have been collecting gum ball capsules and the toy prizes inside them since high school. I have an on going art project using these gum ball capsules and my penny gum ball machine!

What I Learned:

1. I think I like thinking up fun student lessons and trying them out in the classroom, rather than all the mandatory lesson planning, scheduling and all the academics that focused and prepped for the National and State tests that were basically scripted when I left teaching.

I hope if it's still that way, teachers can put the FUN back into teaching in their own ways, like the second grade teacher in his email!

2. Phew, teaching is stressful and just writing about it again brought me stress! Work stress is calculated by how many decisions one has to make in a minute. Can you imagine what goes through a teachers mind each minute with 30 students with all their different modalities, needs, levels and time constraints, etc?

Moving on!

10 Halloween color theme gum ball capsules, available here

We welcome requests for various theme colors and they do run out quickly!

photo via JunkDrawerAndMore

Thank you Etsy buyer from Hoarder Rehab for leaving me such a detailed and fun email! It brought back some nostalgic memories! Thank you so much!

Kudos to you for keeping the joy and excitement in learning! Good luck with your second graders and let me know how inspiring your gum ball writing prompts are this year! I'd love to hear about it! Maybe one of the prompts will be to write the gum ball capsule lady on Etsy!

Thank you Etsy for the best Hoarder Rehab ever!

Thank you all readers from all over the world who have stopped by to visit my Hoarder Rehab and The Destiny of Things!

10 empty pastel color gum ball capsules, available here

photo via JunkDrawerAndMore

I am returning to my dehoarding goals and am starting to new list and relist at each shop! My goal is to list 200 items on each shop again! I am challenged with Etsy's new listing formats and also I'm getting used to a new computer system, so the listing is happening slowly, but surely!

Click on the shop names to visit new hoard listed daily and/or weekly: HoarderRehab with 186 items, The Destiny of Things- 172 items, VintageToGoEasy - 172 items and now JunkDrawerAndMore - 174 items!