Dinosaurs and Pirates

Working in special needs education, I have to try to capture the children's interest to hook them into the learning that they find difficult on a daily basis.  Dinosaurs and pirates are two topics that I know most children (but particularly boys) like and as the ratio is normally 3:1 boys to girls in my small group work then these are the two themes I have been working predominantly on over the past few months.

I mention this because I have just signed up to another website that allows teachers to sell their products online and therefore have a new store located at:

http://www.resources4teaching.com/pempis-palace.html

I am offering my dinosaur literacy packet comprising of a cvc phonics emergent reading book plus lots of other activities (34 pages in total) at a price of $2.50.  (I did want to sell it at $2 but for some reason the website has adjusted the price upwards).  One of the reasons for joining this site is I currently earn less than half of what I sell for so although it is always a true delight to see that I've sold a product I know that I will be receiving only pennies for it.  This new website offers earnings of 70% so I will see how it goes - it is a very new start up in comparison to TpT - so anything could happen.  I am also displaying their banner to promote the store and to possibly earn myself 5% of sales when anyone clicks the link and then purchases through it - let's face it every little helps in today's economy.

The current book I am writing and illustrating for my little literacy group at the moment is all about pirates (whilst we learn to read and write our colour words) and I hope to be featuring this in an upcoming post sometime next week when it is finally finished.  I am working with the children to write new chapters based on their input and ideas - a collaborative piece that is working really well.  I do like it when children can use their imaginations and see their creations come to life so to speak.  I am also so grateful to the creative brilliance of Laura Strickland at http://www.mycutegraphics.com/
who allows her art to be used by teachers such as myself for our products free of charge.  She says it is her way of giving back to education and I can only say the children I share her clipart with certainly gain from having her artworks in their life.

Do you know of any other artists who share their creativity for free to help educate children?  Would you like to give me some feedback on my products if you are another teacher out there?  What have you found to be interesting topics that hook children into learning?  Let me know your thoughts :)