Can you believe it? It is almost the END of the school year! It has been challenging, exciting, twisty and turny and full of all of the best parts of ourselves! Can you believe that we are so close to finishing up? Let’s make sure we end our year with some FUN! Our students have worked so hard this year and have been through a whole lot with the pandemic and the changes we have seen in the past few years! Fun is definitely the way to end the year! Looking for ideas? Then look no further! Here are the top 10 end of the school year activities full of FUN!
GLOW DAY!
Glow in the dark? Yes please! This is one of my personal favorite end of the school year activities. Kids of all ages will love this glow theme day! It is time to transform your classroom into a glow in the dark learning world! The best part is that the work is done for you! Everything you need for an engaging glow in the dark day is in my store and ready to go. Yes, you may need to purchase some black lights, but think about it as an investment because you will be doing GLOW DAY every year for sure!
Even better, my glow day resources include a full day’s worth of activities and ideas! There are banners, signs, and wall decor to set your classroom up for the full experience, and website links to make sure you can grab all the additional supplies you might need, quickly and easily!
Along with all of that, the bundle includes morning work or early finisher work, mazes, coloring, doodle challenges and more. Don’t worry because the day will be a day of learning with the firefly writing prompts and glowing science experiments. The kids won’t even know they are learning though! Have some more fun with the Glow Stations! Glow bowling, ring toss, sight word cup stacking, and even glow Jenga. There are 10 total stations so run over to TpT and check out the pack now by clicking here!
THEME DAYS!
Who doesn’t love a good theme? If you couldn’t tell theme days are one some of my favorite end of the school year activities. Kids will be ecstatic when they enter your themed classroom to celebrate and have some fun at the end of the year. Kids lose steam as we near the year end, but theme days will keep them wanting more! Two really cool theme days that I have done before are Monster Day and Dinosaur Day! Both themes are built and ready for you on TpT with everything you could need.
Both themed resources are jam packed and full of engaging, hands-on activities. Of course, they include links to help you prepare for the theme days, and make them extra fun. Dinosaur Day and Monster Day both include a STEM challenge to build a dinosaur trap or a monster trap paired with the books, How to Catch a Dinosaur, or How to Catch a Monster, a favorite series among students.
Monster Day also includes a great activity working on monster adjectives, a wonderful review for the end of the year! Who doesn’t love describing a monster? Just take a look at the 5-star reviews from real teachers if you want to know how fun theme days are! Ellie S., a first grade teacher wrote, “This is my new favorite thing!! I will be doing this every year from now on! So engaging and fun and the kids absolutely loved it.” This is the perfect activity for the end of the year, so go check out DINOSAURS HERE and MONSTERS HERE! Your students will be full of excitement!
CRAFTS!
Let’s get creative! Students love to create and take something home to share with their families! What better way to make the end of the year fun, but by giving our elementary students something to remember the best school year ever?! Baby Shark, do, do, do, do is a classic. Why not have your students create some sharks themselves! The set includes, craft templates (shark back/fins, belly, eyes, teeth and more) with boy and girl craft parts included.
Let’s keep the kids writing with various writing templates included for preschool-fourth grade! The templates have two different versions (one with numbers, one without) plus two different handwriting lines included and there are even two extra writing prompts included for early finishers! Combine this great craft with some books about sharks and have some fun! Click HERE for the link to the TpT set!
Sharks are cool, but so are Robots! When you’ve finished your week on sharks, move on to the robot crafts! Let the students use robot craft parts, which can be printed on colored paper or easily be used for students to color them! Of course, writing templates are included with the adorable theme “I Love School a “BOT”! Writing about the end of the year is an awesome way to share what students have learned and what they are looking forward to as they move forward to the next year! Check out the link HERE!
Plus so many of these can be turned into beautiful bulletin board displays.
MEMORY BRACELETS!
After all, it is all about the memories! Every year the students love to share everything they have done so they will never, ever forget! One of those end of the year activities that is so much fun and a great way to reminisce is making memory bracelets! Totally easy to use templates are available in my TpT store ready to go! The templates are available to use for all grades, pre-k through sixth grade! There are even templates for Girl Scouts and Boy Scouts, resource rooms, and more! Make special bracelets with simple beads and connect each bead to a memory. Using pipe cleaners makes it the perfect project for every student! Check it out here!
LETTERS!
Looking to keep it simple? Another super fun activity that students really enjoy is writing letters! These letters can be thank you letters to their teachers, (don’t forget art, music and gym teachers!), or to their classmates for supporting and working together all year! Grab some construction paper and makers and you already have the supplies in your classroom! Another option is to assign secret partners to your class and have them write a letter about the exceptional qualities of another student. The element of surprise and secrets will keep it exciting! Students could also write a letter to their families at home sharing their favorite memories of the year! Have them include some pictures of their favorite classroom activities!
HOW TO SURVIVE THIS CLASS BOOK!
One of the best activities is asking the students to reflect on the year and give advice (or survival tips) to the class coming next year! This is a ton of fun because the kids will get really into describing all of the fun and challenging events of the year! They may even write about theme days and how they should do all of their work all year to get them at the end of the year! Students may write about teacher quirks, like when Mrs. Thompson gives the eye, watch out! Other ideas for students to write about are their favorite units. Was it multiplication? How about measurement or reading? Was there a special field trip?
Once the students complete their book, staple the book together and share it with your class next year! The kids will of course come back and ask if you shared their ideas! If you want to take it a step further, hit the copy machine and make a copy for each student to take home!
GO OUTSIDE!
Another simple one to add to the end of the school year activities list. It’s so much fun is taking your class outside! Spend the day doing a read aloud and having snack time basking in the sunlight. Grab some chalk from the $1 store or from your art teacher and have the students get creative! Have a scavenger hunt around the school! Every kid will remember being outside with their class at the end of the year and the change of pace will get them so excited about the day! A little vitamin D is good for the end of the year for teachers too!
CLASS VIDEO!
You know all those pictures you have compiled all year? It is time to add them into a simple slideshow to share with your students! Add a few transitions and boom, a whole movie! If you are a little bit more technical there are tons of APPS that will help you make the video too! Students a little older? Have them get involved and add captions to the slides giving them the chance to remember all of the great times you had this year! Share with your students’ families too.
BOOK SWAP!
Kids collect books and after reading them once, they begin to collect dust on their bookshelves at home. Organize a book swap! Students bring in one or two books that they no longer read and get to swap them with classmates that are doing the same! Talk about summer reading! This is a great opportunity to get new books into students’ hands without having to purchase a ton of new books. Looking for more books, check your local library to see if they have any weeded books to donate! Be sure to send home a letter to parents letting them know too and you may get a few extra books sent in from different students! If you are really looking for more, organize a book swap for the whole grade and there will be tons of books to choose from!
GRAFFITI WALL
Butcher paper? Markers? Yup, that is all you need to create a graffiti wall! Use some tape or command strips to hold up your long sheet of butcher paper and let the kids go for it! Students can share their favorite memory, draw a picture (maybe even a self portrait), write their goals for the future, share what they learned this year, or simply sign their names. Again, this is a ton of fun for all elementary age students and easy to prepare! Early finishers? Have them go draw on the graffiti wall! Don’t forget to take a picture to add to your class video!
End of The School Year Activities
With the end of the year upon us, it is time to start thinking about having some fun! Let’s end the school year on a note of fun! These top 10 end of the school year activities sare super fun and exciting! It has been a long year and you and your students deserve a little fun to end your year off right! Let me know what works for you!