Message from jwyss

[Anonymous]

Not foot, not postage, not food, but rubber; yup, rubber stamps. I dig rubber stamps and so do my 7th grade students. They love stamps. They create and maintain lists of who will stamp on a daily basis and get really ticked if someone messes with the list. They mope if they miss class and the list ratchets down; yes, I'm amazed that it motivates some to be in class on their stamping day or request in advance a list adjustment.

I use them to give extra credit, mark completion of homework, to stamp planners, and to provide a basis for the students own coloring (just as in the hobby of stamping), and for use by students who want to illustrate their work with them. Many students keep a page for stamps in their notebook and collect the various images. And most, of course, want to stamp themselves, but that is forbidden at our school...

Since stamps come in all sizes, I look for those small enough to stamp planners or those that will fit above the title bar or in the margin of students' papers. Some assignments I have designed with enough white space to accomodate a larger stamp.

I have haunted e-bay and other on-line stores until I have found several stamps for each unit in the curriculum from Rome to the Enlightenment. Remember they come both mounted and unmounted and sometimes in large uncut sheets. The unmounted usually end up costing me more, though the initial cost is much less, since they have to be mounted at the local stamp store; one of these days, when I have the TIME, I'll buy the adhesives and backings and saw my own wooden mounts.

One nice set is The Chinese Chop Pack which has 8 small chops (approx. 1/2" sq.), an ink pad and an eighty page booklet. Here's an address at Amazon

Check out the attachment.