Can you draw a circle?  We love circle charts, anchor charts, and word webs. We love our center wheel.  But people, those circles make me crazy.  For my life, I cannot draw circles.  I tried to find objects to trace.  But nope.  Nothing made me happy.  Tried a lanyard.  Got all tangled up.  And nothing is worse than a kindergarten teacher tangled up in a lanyard.  Trust me.

So, I asked my friends on the Kindergarten Smorgasboard Facebook page how they drew circles.  My talented friend Ashton said these magical words:  paint stick with holes drilled in it.   Makes perfect circles of all sizes.  A perfect circle?  Could it be that easy?  (And this is why I love the Kindergarten Smorgasboard community on Facebook!  So many amazingly talented teachers sharing their ideas to make us all better!! )

And paint sticks are free if you ask nicely at stores.

Classroom Hack: Making A Circle Maker

So, how do you make this classroom hack?

You need a paint stick and a drill.

Drill a hole in the handle of the paint stick.  This is where you’d put a pencil to hold the paint stick while making the circles.

Drill holes along the paint stick.  These holes make various size circles.    The hole placement doesn’t really matter.  We just did random holes but you could measure if you wanted to be specific.

BAM!   It’s that simple!

Perfect circles of all sizes!

Using The Circle Maker!

Here is our new reading center wheel and an ABC BOOTCAMP circle map made with our circle tool!   Such beautiful circles=happy teacher heart!  I have one for home and one for school so I’m never without my perfect circles!

Check out this video to see who we made our circle maker and how we use it to make circles!

For more ideas and resources, check out these posts: