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29 Unexpected Last-Day-of-School Activities Your Students Will Love

Send them off for summer with a smile!

classroom activities end of year

Woohoo! It’s finally here—the last day of school. While most kids are going to be super excited, others may have mixed emotions. Make your last day together extra special with some of these fun activities for the last day of school and send your students into summer with fantastic memories of the school year behind them!

1. Stage your own classroom Olympics

Fun last day of school activities- kids doing an obstacle course in the school gym

What better way to wrap up a great year than with your very own version of the Olympic games? Your kids will love the pomp and circumstance from the opening ceremony and challenging events to the winners on the medal podium.

Learn more: Activity Village

2. Read end-of-year read-alouds

end of the school year read aloud books

Teacher Brenda Tejada knows that the end of the school year is a time of mixed emotions. “Students have worked hard all year and are almost at the finish line,” she says. “Some may be excited for their summer vacation, while others may feel anxious to say goodbye.” Her book list and accompanying activities are a sure bet to help ease the transition. 

Learn more: Tejada’s Tots

3. Hold a classroom trivia tournament

students sitting at desks with their hands raised

This activity is a great wrap-up to review a year’s worth of hard work. Review all the content you’ve covered and pull questions from each subject (this is easier if you plan ahead and gather questions throughout the year). Include questions that test how well students know one another. For instance, which student has four brothers? Students will head off for summer proud of all they’ve learned.

4. Get creative outside

fun last day of school activities- students outside drawing with sidewalk chalk

Grab those buckets of sidewalk chalk and head out to the playground! Encourage students to draw memories from the past year, write shout-outs for friends and staff members, or just draw for the pure joy of creating something.

Learn more: Minds in Bloom

5. Take a meaningful walk

high school graduates walking through the halls of their elementary school

Teacher Courtney G. shares: “The kids from our high school wear their caps and gowns and walk the halls in their elementary school the day before graduation. They go from kindergarten to fifth grade as the students stand in the halls and clap. The fifth graders also do this on the last day of school before they leave elementary school. This is my sixth year teaching kindergarten at my school, so my first kinders are now fifth graders. I’m probably going to cry!”

Source: Shelby County Reporter

6. Let your students teach

fun last day of school activities- student giving a presentation in front of the class

Image: PPIC

Genius hour, sometimes called “Passion Pursuit,” in the classroom is an opportunity for students to explore their own unique interests in a loosely structured but supported way. On the last day of school, let each student teach the class what they have studied and learned.

Learn more: What Is Genius Hour and How Can I Try It in My Classroom?

7. Play end-of-year classmates bingo

Asian students playing bingo

It’s one last chance for students to learn a little something new about their classmates! Grab a free printable with get-to-know-you clues at the link, or design your own to better fit your class.

Learn more: Playdough to Plato

8. List what you’ve learned from A to Z

Student completing a printable A to Z compilation of school year memories- fun last day of school activities

What a great way to look back over what kids have learned! For each letter of the alphabet, have them write and illustrate something they learned or did throughout the year. Hit the link below to get a free printable template for this project.

Learn more: Teaching With Jennifer Findley

9. Set up summer pen pals

young girl writing a letter on paper with a pencil

Before you break for the summer, pair your students up as pen pals. Gather students on the rug and talk about what being a pen pal looks like. Draw names and let each pair spend some time together brainstorming ideas about what they’d like to write about.

Learn more: The Inspired Treehouse

10. Go to the beach

Students enjoying a classroom decorated to look like a beach

Or rather, bring the beach to you! This will take some planning and prep, but kids are seriously going to love it. Get all the tips you need at the link.

Learn more: Sailing Into Second

11. Pass the plate

fun last day of school activities- Paper plates covered in messages and signatures from classmates

Pick up a pack of paper plates and give out some colorful markers. Have each student write their name in the middle of the plate, then start passing! Each student writes complimentary words to describe their classmate, then passes it to the next kid. They’ll each end up with a sweet keepsake for the school year!

Source: Robin Bobo/Pinterest

12. Do a legacy project

students' hands reaching into a tray of purple foam plus a coiled lightbulb emitting purple light

According to the teacher team at Minds in Bloom, a legacy project is a lesson that students create, from objective and materials to procedures, to share with next year’s students. Last year, their students were charged with finding a science experiment that they wanted to share with the class. Each group created a lab sheet that could be shared and conducted the experiment for the class to observe. This awesome idea works across the curriculum, so allow your students to choose the topic they love the most.

13. Make ice cream

Fun last day of school activities- girl in pink blouse making ice cream in a ziploc bag

Ice cream parties are popular last-day-of-school activities, but here’s a sneaky way to add some STEM learning to the fun! Have kids make their own ice cream in a bag, then add some toppings and lay out on the grass to enjoy.

Learn more: Your Home Based Mom

14. Make friendship bracelets

Load up on embroidery floss and let your students loose! They’ll love creating a keepsake that reminds them of this special year every time they look at it.

15. Build roller coasters

boys building roller coaster from plastic straws

STEM challenges make terrific meaningful and fun team activities for the last day of school. Try building a DIY roller coaster from drinking straws, or check out lots of other STEM challenges here .

Source: Frugal Fun for Boys and Girls

16. Give pop-up toasts

fun last day of school activities- Student giving a toast in the classroom

Here’s a chance to practice public speaking in a low-key way. Buy some ginger ale and plastic champagne glasses to turn class into a party. Then have kids compose and give a short toast to their friends, teacher, school year, or any topic you choose.

Learn more: Dave Stuart Jr.

17. Just let them play

classroom game involving a cup and cotton balls

Set up game stations and give students time to rotate through each station. Try games like Marshmallow Madness, Scoop It Up, and more at the link below!

Learn more: More Time 2 Teach

18. Host a lemonade tasting

Student holding a cup with a pitcher of lemonade and some lemons- Fun Last Day of School Activities

There’s all kinds of tasty learning worked into this totally sweet idea! Kids taste pink and regular lemonade, then make graphs, write descriptions, learn vocab words, and more.

Learn more: Primarily Speaking

19. Do an in-house service project

Organize your students into teams and leave your school better than you found it. Weed the school garden, write thank-you letters to school staff members, pick up litter outside, help take down hallway bulletin boards. Or see if specials teachers (music, art, P.E., library) need any help getting organized for the end of the year.

20. Compete in a paper airplane contest

child's hand holding a paper airplane with green grass in the background

You know they want to be outside, so take advantage of that and hold the ultimate paper airplane competition. Kids compete in multiple categories, like distance and accuracy, to find the overall winner.

Learn more: The Thinker Builder

21. Serve up a scoop of memories

Paper ice cream sundae with a fun fact about 2nd grade on each scoop- Fun Last Day of School Activities

What a sweet way to celebrate the end of the school year! Make paper ice cream sundaes, with a different memory on each scoop. You can have kids draw these themselves or buy a printable version at the link below.

Learn more: True Life: I’m a Teacher

22. Set up a photo booth

students with emoji pillows over face posing in a classroom photo booth

Photo booths are popular for the first day of school, but they’re terrific for the last day too. Help kids capture memories with their friends before they part for the summer.

Learn more: Teach Create Motivate

23. Wear a Last Day of School crown

printable-last-day-of-school-crown- Fun Last Day of School Activities

Little ones will love coloring and cutting out their very own Last Day of School crown. Check out the link below to buy the printable, or design your own.

Learn more: Teach Starter

24. Create a summer bucket list

Printable Summer Bucket List worksheet (Fun Last Day of School Activities)

Provide kids with lots of options, then have them compile their own bucket lists for the summer days ahead. In addition to fun items, encourage them to add ways to help others or learn something new too.

Learn more: Reasons to Skip the Housework

25. Put the year in a bag

Paper bag and small items; text reads Student Symbols -- This year is in the bag!

This has to be one of the most fun and meaningful last-day-of-school activities. In the days leading up to the final day, have kids give some thought to what symbolizes this past school year to them and place their ideas in a labeled paper bag. On the final day, they’ll give the other students a small token of that symbol and explain their thinking. (They don’t need to buy anything; they can write or draw their symbol instead.)

Learn more: Tarheel State Teacher

26. Take a book-themed museum walk

students doing a

For this project, students create a project that provides a sneak peek of one of their favorite books. They can create posters, dioramas, tri-folds, even dress up as a main character. Give students a couple of weeks to prepare their project at home, then hold your museum walk on the last day of school as a grand finale to the year.

27. Conquer an escape room

Collage of escape room images

Kids love escape rooms, so they’re great activities for the last day of school. Theme yours to what you’ve learned during the year, facts about different classmates, or summer activities. Learn how to set up a classroom escape room here.

28. Dance up a storm

Young students dancing with colored lights- Fun Last Day of School Activities

If you’re looking for fun last-day-of-school activities that get kids moving, hold an epic dance party! Consider having each class submit a song selection for the playlist. They could even choreograph their own special dance moves for when it comes on! We’ve also got fantastic end-of-year playlist ideas for you right here.

29. Send your wishes soaring

Fun last day of school activities- young girl flying a kite

Follow the tutorial below and make paper kites with your students. Have each student write down their hopes and dreams for the future (or alternatively, their favorite memories of the school year) on their kite then go outside and have a launch party.

Learn more: Little Bins for Little Hands

Loving these fun activities for the last day of school? Take a look at these end-of-year assignments and activities for every grade .

Plus, sign up for our free newsletters to get all the latest teaching tips and ideas, straight to your inbox.

It's finally here! Celebrate the start of summer break with these unexpected and fun last-day-of-school activities for students of all ages.

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50 Fun End-of-Year Activities and Assignments

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classroom activities end of year

25 Fun End of the Year Classroom Activities

  • By Shelley Gray
  • May 14, 2022

classroom activities end of year

As the end of the school year approaches, it can be more and more difficult to keep your students engaged in and excited about learning. It’s a chaotic time! You’ve got a million things to do and not much time to do it! But I know that you STILL want to make sure that these days are memorable for your students. Luckily, there are tons of different, fun ways to keep your students learning right until the last day of school! Here are 25 end-of-the-year classroom activities to make the year-end memorable for both you AND your students.

1: Do passion projects. Have students choose a topic that they are passionate about. This can be ANYTHING – soccer, dogs, the environment, or fashion. Have students decide on a topic and guiding questions, and then complete research. Then have students create a PowerPoint presentation, poster, or lapbook in order to present their information.

2: Create a memory book. Reflecting on all the things that have happened over the year is sure to bring pride and laughter to your students. This memory book is created lapbook style, allowing your students to make their books unique.

end of the year

3: Try a room transformation . Bring a small tent, some checkered tablecloths, and flashlights, and you’ve got yourself a fun camping-themed room transformation! Use this free math project to align your curriculum with the camping theme!

classroom activities end of year

4 : Have a bake sale! Have students bring in baking to sell to raise money for a local charity. Use this as an opportunity to work with money in a real-life setting.

5: Do a “Meet the Teacher” day when next year’s class comes to meet the teacher and do an activity together.

6: Have the students write a letter to the upcoming students . Have them include their favorite part of the year as well as tips to be successful. 

7: Plan a picnic lunch! Take your class outside for a special picnic.

8: Hand out classroom awards! Use PowerPoint to make your own awards to suit the students in your class, or try these pre-made classroom awards that focus on positive character traits like optimism, curiosity, persistence, leadership, and kindness!

end of the year awards

9: Have a pizza party and let students make their own personal pizzas! Add an ELA and Math component by writing about “How to Make a Pizza” and incorporating fractions. This Pizza Place Math Project might also come in handy!

10: Create a time capsule to open when your class graduates! Include a “Letter to My Future Self” as well as any memorable items from the year. Have students write down memories to include as well.

11: Pass a ‘Graffiti Page’ for each student around the room; all kids write a compliment for each of their classmates. Your students will love reading all the compliments when they get their own graffiti page back!

12: Try an Escape Room! Escape rooms are fun for any time of the year, but are especially wonderful for keeping your students engaged in those last days of school. This Trapped in the School for Summer Escape Room will have students jumping with excitement as they try to overcome the obstacles and get out of the school! See my best tips for doing an escape room with your class here.

classroom activities end of year

13: Have a Writer’s Workshop celebration! Put out all the books your students have written over the year and give them time to read each other’s books. Hand out hot chocolate as they read to make it extra special!

14: Write thank you notes to someone in the school. This could be another teacher, the custodian, the principal, or anyone else who has made an impact on your students over the year!

15. Play games! Salute , Knock off the Clock , and High Low are just a few examples of fun games you can play with minimal prep and materials. Multiplication Bump is another fun one your students will love!

16. Have a ‘secret’ Random Acts of Kindness Day . Without telling anyone that they’re doing it, have your students do random acts of kindness like holding doors open, giving compliments, etc. throughout the day. At the end of the day, have a conversation about how it felt.

17. Invite a local animal shelter to the classroom to talk about what they do and how you can help. There’s no denying that kids love animals, and I’ve heard from a lot of teachers who have had great success with a talk from a local animal shelter after completing this Run a Pet Shelter Math Project .

18. Hand out End of the Year Activity Books to use as early finisher activities, Friday Fun activities, or just in those times between special events at the end of the year. This activity book includes fun activities like jokes, acrostic poetry, math squares, word search, crossword, code cracking, and more!

end of the year activity book

19. Reinforce growth mindset. When reflecting on the year, don’t just limit it to favorite activities and memorable experiences. Be sure to reflect on how students grew over the year. What did we get better at? What obstacles did we overcome? What did we accomplish as a group?

20. Do a book project . Have students choose the best book they read this year, and use it to create a diorama. Students can do a book talk and present their diorama to the class. Have other students leave a positive comment for each presenter.

21. Do an A-Z Autobiography , where students write something about themselves for each letter of the alphabet. Get a free template for this activity HERE.

22. Make ice cream sundaes! Here’s another great opportunity for a How-To writing piece. If you’d like to incorporate math as well, try this Run an Ice Cream Shop Fraction Project.

23. Get some fresh air! The end of the year is the perfect time to take your students outside to read, have an outdoor class, or even plan an outdoor scavenger hunt! Being outside feels like a “treat” on a beautiful day!

24. Have a snowball fight! Have each student write their favorite memory from the year on a piece of paper, and then crumple it up into a ball. Split the students into two groups, and position the groups at opposite sides of the classroom. Then (when you say “Go!”) have students throw their snowball to the other side. A student should pick it up, read it, and then crumple it up again and throw it for another student to read. This can also be used to review content for any subject!

25. Have a board game afternoon! Have students bring in their favorite board games, and spend the afternoon playing them!

Have ideas to add? Leave them in the comments below!

Thank you ❤️ Great ideas

Thank you for these ideas. I love all of them! These activities are really good ways to end the school year with a bang.

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June 5, 2021

13 Fun End of the Year Classroom Activities

classroom activities end of year

End of the year classroom activities can be tricky to plan because students and teachers are burned out with one foot out the door for summer. I have created a list of tried and true end of the year classroom ideas that are engaging and easy to use for students. Fun end of the year classroom activities can be found below or in highlights.

End of Year Activities

End of the Year Classroom Activities: Fictional Short Stories

End of the year classroom activities are important before saying goodbye. Use entertaining short stories in your classroom at the end of the school year. I use ghost stories or murder mysteries because students love them, and they are a great way to engage students while managing your classroom. Some examples of great short stories to use are: “The Elevator” by Roald Dahl , “Lamb to the Slaughter” by Roald Dahl , “ The Landlady” by Roald Dahl, “The Monsters are Due on Maple Street” by Rod Serling , “ The Yellow Wallpaper” by Charlotte Gilman Perkins , “The Monkey’s Paw” by W.W. Jacobs , (Full lessons on Teachers Pay Teachers) and more. Have students complete a close reading on one of the short stories, and complete an interactive digital lesson. I focus on a review of the plot structure diagram which includes graphic organizers, videos, close reading, audio, short film, and follow-up activities. Students stay busy while you circle the room and answer questions.

classroom activities end of year

End of the Year Classroom Activities: Write Letters

Write Letters -students can write letters to the incoming students for the following year. I have students introduce themselves, write about their best experience in the class and their worst. They include their favorite types of assignments/projects/authors etc. and their least favorite assignments/projects/authors etc. Students provide specific advice on how to “survive” or succeed in the course . Students include their own fears and expectations for the following year. Lastly they include one item they believe will help the incoming student. The following year you can use this as a teambuilder. Have students read the letter and share the object their student left for them.

classroom activities end of year

End of the Year Classroom Activities: Organize Class Library

Organize a book library -I have a library of books that gets jumbled up every year and it is time consuming to put everything back. At the end of the year I have each student take a book from the bookshelf. They are to read critiques about the book on the internet, write a summary about the book, re-label it with the assigned book number, and place it back on the shelf where it belongs. I then print out all the book summaries with numbers, place them in a binder with page protectors and leave it on the shelf for the students the following year. This way when a student needs an independent reading book they can thumb through the binder to find one that interests them, and easily locate it on the book shelf.

End of the Year Classroom Activities: Digital Portfolio

Create a digital portfolio -Students are to save their work in their binders for the entirety of the year with important assignments. At the end of the year they create a digital portfolio using software like OneNote to organize and showcase their work. They are to use samples for reading, writing, listening, and speaking. Students will then take time to review their classmates portfolios and make positive comments. You can also have parents review the portfolio at home filling out a sheet of paper.

End of the Year Classroom Activities: Awards

Have an awards ceremony for the class-Use citizenship, grades, and have students vote and create a separate criteria and set of standards for awards. Some can be serious and some can be fun, like “most likely to…”

classroom activities end of year

End of the Year Activities for the Classroom: Nonfiction Articles

Use nonfiction articles to create short, engaging assignments for students. I have students complete a close reading on a nonfiction article followed up with collaborative discussions and activities. I typically use articles that students find mysteries or that are relatable to them such as: “Minecraft” , “Murder He Wrote” , “Dead Mountain” , “Fright White” , “Barbie’s New Body”, (Full lessons on Teachers Pay Teachers) and others. Once they complete an independent close reading on the article, they work in pairs or threes to discuss a controversial question about the article, and complete a collaborative activity. We then finish by sharing out our ideas and opinions at the end.

Short Films and Theme

Short films and theme -Use animated short films to review themes that were discussed throughout the year. Some of examples of themes you can write on the board are: the need to belong, social outcasts, grief, loss, the affects of war, the affects of racism, etc. Students are to watch the short film, and as a group try to guess which theme matches the short film and how it connects to the reading. I would have students watch a film, stop and match a theme, discuss as a class, and move on to the next film. Students absolutely LOVE this activity!

classroom activities end of year

Station Activities Review of Year

Station activities -use station activities to review a concept they learned during the year such as theme, genre, symbol, plot, etc. I like to use theme by having something different at each station such as a poetry slam, self-test , like Harvard’s How Bias Are You?, controversial short film with questions, creative activity such as drawing blindly, controversial statement for students to discuss, social emotional learning activity, etc. Students are engaged while they are able to move about the room in an organized fashion. Teacher circulates throughout the room to monitor progress.

End of the Year Classroom Party Ideas

Have a party ! It’s difficult to have parties now because teachers have so many students and a party is just too expensive! Have students sign up to bring in an item to eat or drink to match a theme from the year. For example, when I finished up a unit on “Lord of the Flies”, we had a Hawaiian theme for our end of the year party. Students created the decorations themselves, signed up to bring in food, and we had an absolute blast! Depending on your district you may want to get a written permission slip from each students parents to participate in the party.

classroom activities end of year

Classroom Activities for the End of the School Year: Movie Review

Have a movie week -Use movies from books that were read throughout the year and have a movie week! This can be done by having students answer questions about elements from the books/movies and can even serve as a review for their final. If you have a principal who is laid back, you could also just throw in the latest Disney movie to keep them busy that final week of school.

Games: Imaginary Places

Imaginary Places -Turn the lights down and play some instrumental music. Invite students to move about the room in time to the music. Ask them to listen closely and imagine what kind of place the music reminds them of. They can “pretend” to be in that place as all of the other students arrive. When every student is present, gather students in a circle and tell the rest of the class which place he/she was imagining. Let the kids know that essence of creativity is using their imaginations to create different places and people wherever they are!

Games: Camp Fire

Camp Fire -Designate an area of the room where the group routinely meets in a circle. Create an imaginary fire in the middle of the circle. Dim the lights and invite the kids to sit around the “campfire” with their snacks. You may choose to tell a story, or ask for each student to contribute something such as telling the class about a time when they felt really scared, or something that no one else knows about them. A “talking stick” is a really great item to have on hand for campfire time.

classroom activities end of year

Games: Two Truths and a Lie

Two Truths and a Lie -Each student is told to write down two truths and one lie about themselves. Take turns going around the room and have students share out. Other students will guess which one is a lie. Example: I have swam with sharks, I saw Adam Sandler when I was 16, and I work part-time for a celebrity. The answer I work part-time for a celebrity. Every student shares. It’s a fun way to get to know each other. By the way, all of those examples are true for me.

Games: Hot Seat

Hot Seat -This fun game is a lot like the game show  Password . Split your class into two teams and have them sit together in teams facing the whiteboard or chalkboard. Then take an empty chair—one for each team—and put it at the front of the class, facing the team members. These chairs are the “hot seats.” Choose one volunteer from each team to come up and sit in the “hot seat,” facing their teammates with their back to the board. •Prepare a list of vocabulary words to use for the game. Choose one and write it clearly on the board. Each team will take turns trying to get their teammate in the hot seat to guess the word, using synonyms, antonyms, definitions, etc. Make sure team members work together so that each member has a chance to provide clues.  •The student in the hot seat listens to their teammates and tries to guess the word. The first hot seat student to say the word wins a point for their team. Once the word is successfully guessed, a new student from each team sits in the hot seat, and a new round begins with a different word.

I would love to hear about your favorite end of the year classroom activities! Please leave in the comments below!

Products from above sold in Teachers Pay Teachers Shop

“The Elevator” by Roald Dahl

“Lamb to the Slaughter” by Roald Dahl

“The Landlady” by Roald Dahl

“The Monsters are Due on Maple Street” Rod Serling

“The Yellow Wallpaper” by Charlotte Gilman Perkins

“The Monkey’s Paw” by W.W. Jacobs

“Dead Mountain”

“Fright White”

“Murder He Wrote”

“Barbie’s New Body”

“Minecraft”

Teambuilders

Teaching Tolerance-Station Activities

To visit my blog post on short story lessons, click HERE

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classroom activities end of year

20 End of the Year Activities to Engage Your Students

  • Engagement , Planning , Seasonal

classroom activities end of year

Let’s face it. At the end of the year, your students have high energy and are super excited that school is about to end. And honestly, who can blame them. You are likely ready for the break yourself. So how can you keep these children focused, motivated, and engaged without losing your sanity and without them bouncing off the walls? Check out these 20 different end of the year activities to help!

As the end of the school year approaches, consider checking out this post with 20 end of the year activities to get you started! Here you can find ideas for End of the Year awards, End of the year class party ideas, end of the year reflection, end of the year celebration ideas, and so much more. This is the perfect place to prep for fun EOY activities-- and grab an end of the year bingo for free!

While you may not want to do all of these activities in one school year, you can pick and choose ones to try. You can also pin this post to return to next year. Some activities may work well with one group and not so well with the next. It’s always about trial and error. Don’t be afraid to put your own little twist on these end of the year activities too!

#1 – End of the Year Countdown

Students love to see how many more days they have left until summer break. Having an end of the year countdown is a great way to help them focus on how many more days they still need to learn. It should (but may not!) keep them from asking you how many more days until break! Your countdown can be something as simple as a number on the board that is changed each day to a paper chain or something even fancier. I’ve also seen teachers attach activities to countdowns. Check out this link with countdown ideas .

#2 – “Adventure of the Day”

As you approach the last few days of school, it’s completely okay to step outside of the routine. In fact, moving away from routine is a fresh way to grab your students’ attention. Consider heading outside to learn or having an “ Adventure of the Day ” activity. These could be activities such as:

  • sitting on your desk for 30 minutes
  • switch seats with a friend
  • sit on the floor
  • have popsicle time
  • sitting outside in the shade
  • have an extra recess
  • have extra reading time

Just write a few ideas down and draw them from a hat. Let the students know the day before what the next day’s adventure will be. This advance notice helps them prepare and it’s a motivator to not lose the next day’s adventure.

Put a little excitement in your day at the end of the year with this end of the activity. This adventure of the day is a card set that allows your students to do one activity each day that is out of the ordinary. It is motivating and can be used as a reward! It helps your students stay on task during a high-energy part of the school year. Click through to learn more.

#3 – Create a Number Book

As the end of the school year approaches, consider checking out this post with 20 end of the year activities to get you started! Here you can find ideas for End of the Year awards, End of the year class party ideas, end of the year reflection, end of the year celebration ideas, and so much more. This is the perfect place to prep for fun EOY activities-- and grab an end of the year bingo for free!

It’s likely you have heard of the ABC book that students make at the end of the year with all the activities they have done throughout the year for each letter. The number book is similar, but instead of letters, it’s well, with numbers. Give prompts with each number such as the ones in the infographic below. You can find the countdown number book in my TpT Store by clicking here.

This infographic is the perfect resource for your end of the year activities! It is complete with 10 number prompts as you begin your end of the year countdown. You can use all these prompts in your classroom, or save time and grab the end of the year number book in my tpt store! Either way, I hope your end of the school year is great!

#4 – Fingerprint Art

Out of all the end of the year activities, this one is one of the best. Students love art. Students love “autographs.” Combine them together and you have this activity! Have students create an image on a piece of paper such as a tree. Then grab some ink pads and have each student ink up one finger. Then have them move around the room and place their “fingerprint autograph” on each person’s paper. After they have left their fingerprint, they should write/sign their name next to it. Continue “scooting” around the room until every student has completed everyone’s art. (Depending on your class, you may wish to have students pass around the art instead of them moving around.)

#5 – Have a Yarn Toss

In a yarn toss activity, the teacher begins by holding a ball of yarn and sharing something. In this case, it would a memory of the school year or something learned. Then the ball is tossed to a student sitting in the circle while the teacher holds on to a string. The student who now has the yarn ball will share, hold on to part of the yarn, and toss it to a student who has not had it yet. This continues until all students have had the yarn. When finished, you end up with a “web” of yarn. While many teachers have used this activity before for other content, I like to use it to share our memories and things we have learned throughout the year. When done, I like to point out that we have become connected just like we have with the yarn. Then I talk about how if we were to toss the yarn ball again, we would probably get a different result. The point is that they may never be connected again in the exact same way as this school year so they should take the time to reflect on this school year and appreciate what they learned and how they grew.

#6 – Book Brackets

At the end of the year is a great time to think about all of the books your students have really enjoyed. Have students create a list of their favorite books and then create a set of competing brackets. (Similar to what you would have in March Reading Month with March Madness basketball). If you have time, consider rereading some of the books to vote each competing book to the number one slot!

As the end of the school year approaches, consider checking out this post with 20 end of the year activities to get you started! Here you can find ideas for End of the Year awards, End of the year class party ideas, end of the year reflection, end of the year celebration ideas, and so much more. This is the perfect place to prep for fun EOY activities-- and grab an end of the year bingo for free!

#7 – Graphing

Along with determining students’ favorite books from the year, you can find out their other favorite events during the school year and create graphs. This can be done on your whiteboard using post-it notes. Have students write their name on the post-it notes and places it on the whiteboard in the proper location based on their favorites. This engaging activity is a great way to review data analysis, a content skill that is often taught at the end of the year.

#8 – An “Unordinary” Awards Ceremony

Nearly every teacher hands out awards at the end of the year as part of their end of the year activities. They are usually the typically “best listener,” “good friend” type awards. There is definitely nothing wrong with those kinds of awards, but why not switch it up a little with the Unordinary type? What am I talking about? Why not provide awards that will make your students laugh? For example, give the award “Most likely to not be abducted by an alien” or “Most likely to fly to mars.” Giving students the unexpected will be delightful! Check out these End of the Year Silly Awards !

As the end of the school year approaches, consider checking out this post with 20 end of the year activities to get you started! Here you can find ideas for End of the Year awards, End of the year class party ideas, end of the year reflection, end of the year celebration ideas, and so much more. This is the perfect place to prep for fun EOY activities-- and grab an end of the year bingo for free!

#9 – Give a Sneak Peek

Kids always love when they think they are in on a secret. Tell students that you are going to share a secret with them but they have to keep it on the down low. You are going to give them a sneak peek into what next year is going to look like. Then give them a small little packet of next year’s work. Don’t go too hard with the content, as you wouldn’t want to make them panic and decide they need to stay in their current grade forever. If it’s easy enough, you can send them off on their own to complete independently. Otherwise, consider giving a small mini-lesson. When finished, empower them by expressing how ready they are for the next grade!

#10 – Sneak in Some Small Chunks of Review

Not ready to look at next year yet? Some of your students may be barely hanging on to the current year and I totally get that! Instead, consider reviewing the current year in small chunks. With the students being high energy, you aren’t going to get large periods of focus. Consider reviewing with review calendars, review packets, or review games.

#11 – Let’s Do a Project!

I love working on projects with my students, but they tend to take up a lot of time during the school year and I feel pressured to rush through it to finish other curricula. When students are closing in on the end of the year, they have the looming deadline of school ending which makes them feel rushed, not me. If you aren’t sure which project to have your students work on, consider a choice board. Students love when they are given choices!

I like to vary what projects I do from year to year. What we work on will depend on what my students still need to focus on. Sometimes my students need to work on their writing skills, so we will complete a state research project . Other times we will complete a project-based learning project such as designing a house or creating an ecosystem in science.

#12 – Memories…

Of course, it wouldn’t be a proper end of the year activity if we didn’t do something to remember the year in paper form. Memory books, such as my snapshots of the year memory booklet, can be made with a paper bag or construction paper. You could also have your students create their own memory books or foldables using end of the school year writing prompts or reflections. You could also have them create an end of the year accordion , such as the one below.

As the end of the school year approaches, consider checking out this post with 20 end of the year activities to get you started! Here you can find ideas for End of the Year awards, End of the year class party ideas, end of the year reflection, end of the year celebration ideas, and so much more. This is the perfect place to prep for fun EOY activities-- and grab an end of the year bingo for free!

#13 – Chalk Talk

Speaking of using writing prompts or reflections, you could place one on a piece of chart paper and hang it around the room. After hanging several different prompts, reflections, or sentence starters around the room on chart paper, have students move around with their own markers and respond. If you’d rather, you can keep a different chart paper at each group of students and have them move from group to group.

#14 – Theme Days

Students love theme days. You can choose to multiple theme days or just one. It’s completely up to you. One year I brought in a few mini pop-up tents and set them up in my classroom. We pushed all the desks off to the side and hung out in tents all day. (We did not zip the tent doors closed.) We had a pretend fire made out of butcher paper and everything. Get creative. You can find all kinds of resources related to various themes such as beach day, camping adventures, and so much more on Teachers Pay Teachers.

As the end of the school year approaches, consider checking out this post with 20 end of the year activities to get you started! Here you can find ideas for End of the Year awards, End of the year class party ideas, end of the year reflection, end of the year celebration ideas, and so much more. This is the perfect place to prep for fun EOY activities-- and grab an end of the year bingo for free!

#15 – End of the Year Bingo

Provide students with a bingo board that explores students’ summer plans. This is an engaging activity that gets students up and moving around the room and talking to other students. It also gives you an idea of whether a summer packet or reading program is likely to be completed over the summer. You can grab a FREE End of the Year Bingo sheet at the end of this post.

#16 – Encouragement Notes

I’m huge on self-esteem and lifting students up. Especially right now when it seems bullying is at its highest. Why not have students write encouragement notes to one another for next year. You can assign each student another person in class (to ensure each person receives a note) or let them pick. You could also have them draw names from a hat. You could also write an encouragement note to each student yourself. Students love reading these and they are incredibly helpful when the next school year starts and students are feeling nervous.

#17 – End of the Year Writing and Reflections

To continue practicing their writing skills, have students reflect and write about the school year. Each day you could post a sentence starter on a bulletin board or write it on your whiteboard for students to complete. Another option is to place cards in a center or provide them with end of the year writing prompts on a sheet such as the ones shown below. Having students think back on the year is helpful and beneficial to them.

As the end of the school year approaches, consider checking out this post with 20 end of the year activities to get you started! Here you can find ideas for End of the Year awards, End of the year class party ideas, end of the year reflection, end of the year celebration ideas, and so much more. This is the perfect place to prep for fun EOY activities-- and grab an end of the year bingo for free!

#18 – Welcome Brochure

Most teachers like to have an advice letter of some sort for students who are coming in the following year. Instead of having your students write it in letter form, why not have them create a brochure. Each panel could be something regarding what to expect. For instance, students could include information about the teacher, things they’ll learn, things they’ll do, your top rules/pet peeves, advice, what to expect, how to be successful, etc. Then when the school year begins, you can set the brochures out during open house or meet the teacher night.

#19 – Graduation Letters – A Time Capsule of Encouragement & Love

Have students write themselves a letter for the day they graduate high school. Place the letter in an envelope, seal it and write on the outside “Do not purge. Please give it to the student on graduation day.” Then place the letter in the student’s administrative file. This file follows the student from school to school. If you desire, you can place your own letter inside the envelope too before sealing it. If you’re able, consider having teachers from other grade levels add a short encouragement note inside each year too. On graduation day, this will be a huge moment for this student!

#20 – Book Commercial

I always want my students to become avid readers. One way that I do this is by having my students at the end of the year create book commercials. Students choose one book they have read (and loved!) and want to recommend it for next year’s incoming class. They then create a 2-minute video and “advertise” it. We discuss not giving away everything and how to make it enticing. This is similar to my book trailer idea, but the students are on the video themselves.

Grab Your Freebie!

As the end of the school year approaches, consider checking out this post with 20 end of the year activities to get you started! Here you can find ideas for End of the Year awards, End of the year class party ideas, end of the year reflection, end of the year celebration ideas, and so much more. This is the perfect place to prep for fun EOY activities-- and grab an end of the year bingo for free!

Click here to grab your free End of the Year Bingo Activity .

There you have it! My twenty end of the year activities to help you end the school year right! I could probably list several more, but these are to help you get started!

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25 Must-Do End of the Year Activities {and a FREEBIE}

I came home from school yesterday and cried. 

And not because the end of the year is so overwhelming, busy, and exhausting… {although that may be where part of the tears are coming from. JK! #AmIJustKiddingThough??}

But because I’m going to miss my kids SO much. 

For 180 school days, 23 of my third grade students and I have laughed, cried, worked hard, learned so many new things together, and have built some really amazing relationships with one another. 

I’ve watched them grow not only as readers and mathematicians, but in their growth mindset, their confidence and in their character. 

We became a family. 

And this is why the end of the school year is HANDS DOWN my favorite part of the year. We get to have more fun together this time of year, especially with the classroom/family culture that we built. #RelationshipsFirst

And not that we don’t have fun all year long through different classroom transformations , math games, math puzzles , centers, book clubs, group projects, and such…BUT NOW we can really have fun, enjoy each other’s company so much more, relax a bit more because IT IS the end of the year. 

__________________________________

End of the Year Activities

So what activities do you do with your students at the end of the school year?! I’m going to share a list of 21 end of the school year activities that I’ve done with my students. I would love to hear if you have done any of these end of the year activities/themes or if you plan on trying one or more of them! Definitely comment and let me know below!

1. End of the Year Activities: STEM Day

STEM Day is one of my student’s favorite end of the year themed days. During the school year, we have STEM Fridays—where my students will work in table groups to complete a STEM challenge. I literally NEVER have any absent kiddos on Friday because they don’t want to miss the Friday STEM challenge. So, having a STEM Day during the last week of school was a no brainer. These free summer STEM projects are perfect!

Here's a list of 14 MUST-DO end of the school year activities to try in your classroom! You'll find tips and end of the year ideas for end of the year theme days, end of the year printable, and end of the year celebration ideas. Click here to read about these must-do end of the year ideas and download a free end of the year printable activity! #endoftheschoolyear #2ndgrade #3rdgrade #theteacherwearsprada

2. End of the Year Camping Day

Okay, this day is super fun and might be one of my favorites for sure, for sure. I turn our classroom into a mini campsite and my students engage in various Math and ELA camping themed activities. I use the end of the year review activities from this unit . I wrote a detailed blog post about my camping room transformation. You can read all about my Camping Themed Day here .

Here's a list of 14 MUST-DO end of the school year activities to try in your classroom! You'll find tips and end of the year ideas for end of the year theme days, end of the year printable, and end of the year celebration ideas. Click here to read about these must-do end of the year ideas and download a free end of the year printable activity! #endoftheschoolyear #2ndgrade #3rdgrade #theteacherwearsprada

3. End of the Year Game Day

Game Day is super, super easy to implement and you don’t have to do anything. YES and YES. Students bring in their favorite board game or card game, then I give them time to play! Easy. You can choose their groups for them if you want to, or you can have them choose their own groups.

4. Peer Compliments Paper Bag Activity {Class Culture}

I saw this idea on instagram from @hello3rdgrade and instantly became obsessed with it! So how it all works….each student gets a gift bag, which is taped to the whiteboard. Each student also gets a ziploc bag with an index card for each of their classmates.

Then across the span of a the last few weeks of school or so, each student writes a fun memory, a nice message, or a favorite thing about that person. Then, they drop the index card into that person’s giftbag. On the last day of school, each kiddo gets to read all of their notes and take their baggie home.

Here's a list of 14 MUST-DO end of the school year activities to try in your classroom! You'll find tips and end of the year ideas for end of the year theme days, end of the year printable, and end of the year celebration ideas. Click here to read about these must-do end of the year ideas and download a free end of the year printable activity! #endoftheschoolyear #2ndgrade #3rdgrade #theteacherwearsprada

5. End of the Year Math Review Puzzles

Have you heard of Unravel the Fact math puzzles?

Dude. If you haven’t..YOU ARE MISSING OUT {in my opinion, of course *winkie face emoji hehe}

Before I get into how these math puzzles actually work, just know these math puzzles are perfect for  end of the year math review  a nd keeping your students engaged while their minds are thinking about ALL THINGS summer!

How do these math puzzles work?

The MAY/End of the Year EDITION of these cross-curricular Unlock the Fact Math Puzzles reveal facts themed around holidays in May. Your students will  answer  the 9 math problems, put the puzzle strips in order from LEAST to GREATEST. If they have answered the problems correctly and have placed the numbers in order correctly, an interesting fact will be revealed. They will have “unlocked a fact”. Cool, right?!!

Content Integration + Self-Correcting Math Puzzles = Happy Teacher and Engaged Students. BOOM.

Here's a list of 14 MUST-DO end of the school year activities to try in your classroom! You'll find tips and end of the year ideas for end of the year theme days, end of the year printable, and end of the year celebration ideas. Click here to read about these must-do end of the year ideas and download a free end of the year printable activity! #endoftheschoolyear #2ndgrade #3rdgrade #theteacherwearsprada

What themes/facts are featured this month?

Each set of Unravel the Fact Math puzzles include themed facts around that month. The following are included in the May/End of the Year unit:

Asian Pacific American Heritage Month, National Space Day (facts about Planets), National Astronaut Day (facts about Astronauts), National Tuna Day (facts about tuna), National Shrimp Day (facts about shrimp), National Bike Day (facts about history of bikes), National Train Day (facts about history of trains), Cinco de Mayo, Memorial Day, Kentucky Derby, National Egg Month, National Love a Tree Day (facts about trees)

If you’re interested in these puzzles, the 3rd grade version is available here and the 2nd grade version is available here .

Here's a list of 14 MUST-DO end of the school year activities to try in your classroom! You'll find tips and end of the year ideas for end of the year theme days, end of the year printable, and end of the year celebration ideas. Click here to read about these must-do end of the year ideas and download a free end of the year printable activity! #endoftheschoolyear #2ndgrade #3rdgrade #theteacherwearsprada

6. A-Z Reflection Book for End of the Year Reflection {Freebie}

So basically, this A-Z end of the year reflection book is an activity for students to….well…reflect on their school year haha and write down their favorite things, favorite memories, things they learned, etc.

For example, they could write “A is for arrays. In math, I learned to use arrays to figure out the answer to multiplication equations.” Then, students would draw a picture of an array.

The A-Z end of the year booklet can be done individually or as a class.

If you want to grab the free download of this printable book and try it out with your class, just click HERE .

Here's a list of 14 MUST-DO end of the school year activities to try in your classroom! You'll find tips and end of the year ideas for end of the year theme days, end of the year printable, and end of the year celebration ideas. Click here to read about these must-do end of the year ideas and download a free end of the year printable activity! #endoftheschoolyear #2ndgrade #3rdgrade #theteacherwearsprada

Art Day is also another really fun day because sadly, I don’t often have time to do many art projects or crafts throughout the year. For Art Day, I ask our fabulous art teacher to borrow some paint, watercolors, pastels….I bring out my construction paper, markers, all the works and have my kids GO TO TOWN.

Have you done Shaving Cream art in your classroom before?! That’s also a fun art activity!

Speaking of shaving cream, have you used shaving cream in your classroom to clean student desks?! Oh boy! Check it out here .

Here's a list of 14 MUST-DO end of the school year activities to try in your classroom! You'll find tips and end of the year ideas for end of the year theme days, end of the year printable, and end of the year celebration ideas. Click here to read about these must-do end of the year ideas and download a free end of the year printable activity! #endoftheschoolyear #2ndgrade #3rdgrade #theteacherwearsprada

8. Beach Day/Pool Day

Another amazing idea from the GRAM! I saw this on Insta a few weeks ago from Juan (@teaching3rdwithmrg), a third grade teacher, and thought it was pure genius because it’s so simple yet such a memorable & fun day for the kids.

How does this work? Invite your students to bring in small pool floats, beach towels, snacks and reading material, of course. You can move all of your desks and tables to the perimeter of the room so that you have a big open space in your classroom for “the beach” or “pool area”. You can give your students time to laugh and chit chat for a bit while they “relax” by the pool, then get settled in to begin reading by the pool. So fun! I love it!

Here's a list of 14 MUST-DO end of the school year activities to try in your classroom! You'll find tips and end of the year ideas for end of the year theme days, end of the year printable, and end of the year celebration ideas. Click here to read about these must-do end of the year ideas and download a free end of the year printable activity! #endoftheschoolyear #2ndgrade #3rdgrade #theteacherwearsprada

9. Beach Ball Summer Keepsake

I gave each of my students a beach ball and we used sharpies to sign each other’s beach balls. I’ve seen other teachers use frisbees and hats, too!

10. Animal Research Project

My students worked on their animal research project until the very last day of school! This was the perfect project for keeping my kids busy and engaged. My students chose an animal to research {I didn’t let anyone research the same animal}. They used books and sites like World Book Online and PebbleGo to research their animal. They had a choice of making posters or a brochure. The templates for both the poster and brochure are from this unit .

Here’s an example of a poster one of my third graders made. This is the front of her poster. On the back, she talks about the Life Cycle, Adaptations, and other Fun Facts about her animal.

Here's a list of 14 MUST-DO end of the school year activities to try in your classroom! You'll find tips and end of the year ideas for end of the year theme days, end of the year printable, and end of the year celebration ideas. Click here to read about these must-do end of the year ideas and download a free end of the year printable activity! #endoftheschoolyear #2ndgrade #3rdgrade #theteacherwearsprada

11. Make S’Mores with Solar Ovens {So freaking fun!}

I did this with my third graders and we seriously had THEEE BEST time. You can check out this blog post to read about our Solar Ovens.

Here's a list of 14 MUST-DO end of the school year activities to try in your classroom! You'll find tips and end of the year ideas for end of the year theme days, end of the year printable, and end of the year celebration ideas. Click here to read about these must-do end of the year ideas and download a free end of the year printable activity! #endoftheschoolyear #2ndgrade #3rdgrade #theteacherwearsprada

12. Create a Graffiti Wall

I actually haven’t done this one yet but it looked way cool so I had to include it in this end of the year must-do list! I really feel like creating a Graffiti wall in your classroom is perfect for when your bulletin boards become bare as we are closing out the school year. I always feel so bad taking everything off of the walls because the classroom becomes so sad looking. THIS IS THE SOLUTION.

Instead of having the walls totally bare {and slightly depressing} , you can put up some white or light-colored butcher paper on the wall, and have markers available to your students. They can then write shout-outs for their peers, write about fun school memories, write what they loved about third grade or whatever grade level you teach, what they loved learning this school year…the list goes on!!

13. Chalk It Up, YO!

Dude. This one is so easy and so fun. Who doesn’t love playing with chalk? I grab tons of chalk and take my students outside. My students write nice messages or shout-outs to their friends or other teachers in the building, draw or write about memories from the school year, they write out math problems and have each other solve them, and some kids just free draw. We literally just had fun with chalk!

Here's a list of 14 MUST-DO end of the school year activities to try in your classroom! You'll find tips and end of the year ideas for end of the year theme days, end of the year printable, and end of the year celebration ideas. Click here to read about these must-do end of the year ideas and download a free end of the year printable activity! #endoftheschoolyear #2ndgrade #3rdgrade #theteacherwearsprada

14. End of the Year Letter to Future Students

In the past, I’ve had my students write a letter to next year’s class by giving them advice about 3rd grade, their favorite things about 3rd grade, some things they learned this year, what to expect, their FAVORITE things about Mrs. Morie {that’s me hehe} or what you should know about Mrs. Morie { she doesn’t tolerate messy desks, so keep your desk clean! 🙂 }

Here’s a great post about End of the Year Letters and a free template.

15. Sandcastle Craft and Writing Activity

This one is really cute. Students will solve the math problems in order to build a sandcastle. Then, will complete the a writing activity that ties into the craft. Check it out here – differentiated options available, too, like basic addition and subtraction within 20, two digit addition and subtraction with regrouping, three digit addition and subtraction, two by two multiplication, & basic multiplication and division!

end of the year ideas

16. Telling Time PBL Craft and Writing Project

As students read or listen to the story about Rudy’s trip through Europe, they will follow the directions and times for her train rides in order to build the train and her itinerary. Check it out here .

end of the year ideas and activities

17. “Teach” the Teacher

The student and teacher SWITCH roles. The student will now become the teacher and teach a lesson. The student will have 15 minutes to teach the class and you, the teacher, something. They will plan the lesson prior to their assigned day and teach the class how to do something or make something. Some examples include: how to make slime, how to jump rope, how to make a paper airplane, how to do a magic trick, origami, teach words in another language, teach a card trick, etc…

18. Free End of the Year Partner Math Games

Review all those math standards from the school year in this Tic-Tac-Toe style math game. I have free sets for 2nd grade, 3rd grade, and 4th grade. Grab them here .

classroom activities end of year

19. More Math Review Activities – Around the Room Math Hunt

I am obsessed with these. These task cards are so unique and so much fun. As they students solve the math problems, they will generate a silly story, sort of like a mad lib. Check out 2nd grade here , 3rd grade here and 4th grade here .

20. Fraction Friend for End of the Year Review

Want a creative and fun way to review fractions? Check out this little cutie of a fraction friend! You can check it out here in more detail.

fractions activities

21. Word Problem Crafts – Build a Butterfly

Ooooh! This is a fun, yet rigorous one! So, your students will solve the word problems in order to build an adorable butterfly craft! They will find their answers on the butterfly pieces sheet (this is naturally a self-checking activity because if problems were answered correctly, they’ll see their answers on the pieces). Then, they will be able color, cut out the pieces, and build their butterfly! You can find the 1st grade set here , 2nd grade here , 3rd grade here and 4th grade here .

end of the year activities

22. Passion Research Project

Have your students choose a topic. Once you approve the topic, they can begin researching their topic and create a Google Slides presentation. Then, students will take turns presenting. Kids always LOVE doing this!

23. Paper Airplane Challenge

Have students participate in a paper airplane building STEM challenge! Students can work in partners or a small group. They will plan how they’re going to build their paper airplane, they may plan to build 4-6 different types of paper airplanes. Then, they’ll build and test out their paper airplane. You can choose to have different challenges: farthest, longest hang time, etc. Here’s an article you may find helpful about this challenge.

24. Build a Mancala Board

I LOVE playing mancala! Have you played before? It’s a great strategy game and perfect for kids to learn how to play and extend their critical thinking.

You can start by reading an article about the history of Mancala (you could even just project this article onto the screen). If you wanted, you could have students take out a piece of notebook paper, draw a bubble map and record some of the main ideas and main points from the article. Then you can show them this video on how to play Mancala.

Here’s a read aloud on YouTube that goes hand in hand with this activity. The author even shares her time growing up in Ethiopia.

Lastly, students can build their own Mancala game using egg cartons! You can ask families to send in egg cartons. Here’s an article that explains how to make the game out of egg cartons. Once students have finished making their Mancala boards (this may take a day or two), they can begin playing. You could even have a tournament if you’d like!

25. Make Ice Cream!

Okay, this end of the year activity is always a hit for sure. Have your students make ice cream as a STEM activity. Here’s an article that shows you how to make ice cream in a bag.

Well. All good things must come to an end. That’s the end of my 25 Must-Do End of the School Year activities! I hope you found this post helpful and were able to get a few ideas for how to end your school year! 

I’d love to hear what kinds of things you do in your classroom at the end of the year OR if you tried any of the ideas from this list!

Sending hugs and good vibes your way🧡

Nesli

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Home » Blog Posts » Holidays & Seasonal » Fun and Engaging End of the School Year Activities

Fun and Engaging End of the School Year Activities

As the school year draws to a close, teachers are often looking for fun and engaging ways to celebrate their students’ hard work and accomplishments. From classroom parties to field trips, there are plenty of options for end-of-year activities that will leave your students feeling celebrated and excited for the summer ahead. In this post, we’ll explore some of my favorite end of the school year activities for elementary teachers to consider.

Fun and Engaging End of the School Year Activities

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Why We Need Fun End of the School Year Activities!

With summer right around the corner, so many of us are counting down the days in the classroom with fun activities. Fun end of the year activities are an essential component of any elementary school classroom because they provide a chance to build community, celebrate achievements, and bring joy and laughter to the final days of the school year. So as you begin planning your end-of-year activities, remember to prioritize fun and celebration and give your students and yourself the gift of a memorable end to the school year.

classroom activities end of year

Build Community

One of the key reasons why we need fun end of year activities is to help foster a positive classroom community. Throughout the year, students have been working hard to build relationships with one another, and end-of-year activities offer an opportunity to strengthen those bonds. In addition, by engaging in shared experiences and celebrating their achievements, students can develop a sense of camaraderie and support that will carry over into the next school year.

Celebrate Achievements

Another important reason for end of year activities is to help students feel a sense of accomplishment and closure. As they reflect on the year that has passed, students can take pride in all that they have learned and accomplished. Additionally, celebratory activities provide a tangible way for students to acknowledge their hard work and growth and feel closure as they transition to the next grade level.

Bring Joy and Laughter

In addition to benefiting students, fun end-of-year activities can also be a source of joy and satisfaction for teachers. After a long and challenging school year, teachers need to take a moment to celebrate their own hard work and achievements. By planning engaging activities that bring joy and laughter to the classroom, you can feel a sense of fulfillment and pride in your positive impact on your students’ lives.

6 Fun End of the School Year Activities

These end of the school year activities will bring joy and laughter to your classroom as the school year comes to a close. They will help you celebrate students’ achievements and reflect on the incredible memories you made throughout the school year.

#1 End of the Year Digital Activity Maze

The first fun way to wrap up the school year is to offer digital end of the year activities in a game-like format for your students.

classroom activities end of year

Surprise your students with a fun activity that takes them through a maze of different end of the year challenges. Not only will it pique their interest, but they will love the extra chance to use technology in the classroom. Plus, the emojis and gifs add an extra element of fun for kids. 😃 😄 😀

#2 Create an End of the Year Learning Video

One of the amazing digital learning tools I’ve recommended to so many people is Flipgrid. I’m not being paid to sponsor or endorse their site; I just love using Flipgrid for learning!

flipgrid-image for end of the year ideas

Flipgrid is a site that allows students and teachers to create video content for storytelling. You can use it for these end of the year learning ideas:

  • Have all your students make a “Happy Birthday” shout-out video to kids who have birthdays during the summer.
  • Ask students to record a 60-second video naming their favorite memory from this school year. Put all the “video–grids” together to make an end of the year video collage.
  • Blur or pixelate students faces and create a “Guess Who” grid where students get to use clues to find out whose image it is.

If you are new to this service, you can begin with this step-by-step guide. Flipgrid is free to all educators , whether your school is closed due to COVID-19 or not.

#3 Complete an End of Year Memory Wheel Craftivity

Who doesn’t love a good craft-activity aka craftivity? My next fun end of the school year learning idea is to complete an End of the Year Memory Wheel craft.

classroom activities end of year

Your students will LOVE completing this activity because they will follow the easy-to-read details to create a “wheel” with their favorite memories from this school year. Allowing your students to reflect on the good times they’ve had encourages them to keep a positive outlook on school as they head into the summer. Plus, it’s easy enough to assemble so that kids can complete it without needing too much guidance.

#4 Set Up an Indoor Phonics Scavenger Hunt

Make the end of the school year memorable with this phonics indoor scavenger hunt for younger kiddos to enjoy! This activity encourages kids to complete “phonics challenges” by finding items around the classroom that match each phonics rule.

indoor phonics scavenger hunt for kids

Keep the learning going with something fun that doesn’t require worksheets! Your students will gain independence as they complete this self-guided activity with a learning focus. This end of the year learning idea allows kids to enjoy learning right up until the last day of school.

#5 Create an End of The School Year Memory Book

This Memory Book Set will help you and your students reflect back over the school year and record all the highlights of your year in a fun way. The end of the school year is a great time to reflect on memories made together as a class, but that does not mean you can’t make a few new memories on the way out! That’s why I included fun photo props in this memory book set.

classroom activities end of year

#6 End of The School Year Puzzles & Riddles

These fun and fresh puzzles and riddles are great to use with 3rd-5th grade students during the last weeks of school. They will keep students entertained and having fun as they gear up for the summer.

classroom activities end of year

Need more help with the end of the school year?

It’s tempting to try everything at once. We want to go out with a bang. Just remember that less is often more. I encourage you to choose ONE special way you want to wrap up the year.

You can also check out my top tips on how to keep kids from going crazy in the classroom !

end-of-the-year-memory-wheel

More Ideas to End the Year Well

Here are some books, resources, and ideas to make the best of these last days:

  • Amazing End of the Year Read Aloud Books
  • Summer Reading Bookmark Challenges –keep kids engaged with reading this summer
  • End of the Year Teacher Gift Ideas
  • 10 Best Summer Experiences for Teachers

classroom activities end of year

You’re almost to the finish line, beautiful butterfly!

The Butterfly Teacher

2 Responses

Thank you for these great ideas! My team and I have been working on ways to celebrate the end of the year with our students.

Can you explain how you would create the Guess Who grid with blurred faces? Would you have the students create the videos and blur their own faces? Or is this something you would create for the students to do?

Katie, I would take a screenshot of each student’s face and use an online photo editor like Canva or PicMonkey to make the picture more pixelated. You can use any photo editing app or service to make their images slightly blurred for the “Guess Who” grid idea.

OR, you can have students submit a screenshot of themselves with something covering their faces to make the grid. Any idea that would help hide their faces would allow you to play the online Guess Who game.

I hope this answered your question clearly. Thanks for asking! 🙂

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45 Engaging End of Year Assignments for Your Classroom

September 9, 2023 //  by  Eileen Zajac

Building confidence and self-esteem starts with recognizing student success. Having fun end-of-year assignments is a way to celebrate their success throughout the entire school year. Whether they struggled through the year or got straight A’s, completing a grade is a big accomplishment. We’ve created a list of 18 activities projects and more that your students will love and be engaged with! Celebrate your students at the end of this school year, and celebrate YOU!

1. End of the Year Writing

A favorite activity for the end of the year is this summer-themed writing activity. Students love creating their little avatar and writing in the sunglasses always adds a little extra pazazz!

Learn More: 2nd Grade Savvy

2. Plastic Wrapped Desks

This fun activity in the final days of school will remind students HOW MUCH FUN school really is. Have students help you make this super fun fort. Let them spend some class time in here.

Learn More: Flickr

3. End-of-Year Activities in Balloons

No matter which way you look at it, popping balloons is ALWAYS exciting. This activity is perfect for the last few weeks of school. Students will love the simple visual of this countdown.

Learn More: Miss Alexx in Wonderland

4. T-Shirt Painting

Creating t-shirts to hold students’ favorite memories can be so important. Sometimes it’s easier to just do a handprint and everyone’s name, making sure no individual student feels left out!

Learn More: Dr. Cortes Writes

5. Paper Plate Activity

An activity students of any age can participate in. Whether it’s words or pictures, showing students love for their teacher and classmates is always a great way to end the year!

Learn More: Hojo’s Teaching Adventures

6. End of Year Best Reads

End-of-year books are so great for students. Some kiddos might lose their reading love over the summer so it’s important to keep it going for as long as you can with books like Miss Maple’s Seeds & Cloudette .

Learn More: Kinder and Cactus

7. Teacher Likes & Dislikes Whole-class

This can be easily made on google slides/drawings and your students will love it! If you’re still practicing distance learning, put it up on google classroom and let your kiddos prove who knows you best.

8. End of Year Countdown

Fun summer activities like this will not only serve as a countdown to the end of the year but also as a plan for the day. Each balloon will have something special for one or more of your students. Fun enrichment activities like this will keep students engaged and excited to keep coming!

Learn More: Kelcie’s Classroom

9. End-of-Year Whole-Class Poster

A puzzle poster is so much fun for your older students. This could be used as a writing assignment or one of your independent projects, just make sure to give a good assignment explanation so students understand the assignment details and expected outcome.

Learn More: Top Teaching Kids

10. Snapshots of My Year

Memory snapshots will be so much fun for your students to make! Use it as a writing assignment by having them write about their memories on the back of each picture!

Learn More: Loz Loves Prep

11. Wish I May, Wish I Might

Use a book like I Wish You More to help students picture and understand the assignment for these creative, hands-on projects!

Learn More: Coffee-Fueled Classroom

12. End of Year STEM Challenge

Using detailed project instructions students will absolutely love this activity! Archive class teams for this activity and see who can create the strongest or most elaborate treehouse using the materials given!

Learn More: Tumble Shine Gymnastics

13. Icosahedron Memory Share

An extension assignment for the end of the year like this is bound to have middle school students excited for the project. Have students watch a tutorial video on how to make this craft then decorate with their favorite memories.

Learn More: Teaching with Kindness

14. Summer Bucket List

Cute creative ideas like this summer bucket list are great for classes who just love coloring! This can also be made on google drawing if students are working distantly!

Learn More: KC Kindergarten

15. End of Year Scavenger Hunt

A game design that students will love! Have students complete this game with cardboard if you don’t have clipboards! They will love searching the classroom and answering the questions.

Learn More: From Math to Music

16. End of Year Bingo

Find game templates here for this awesome end-of-the-year Bingo game! Students will compete in active teams to complete all of the bingo pockets! This is an engaging game that will help your students talk about their summer plans!

Learn More: The Rigorous Owl

17. Compliment Scoot

Hands down an English class favorite, this compliment scoot allows students to give each other compliments! It’s so cute and fun students will love to create this for their assignment memory book.

18. Pom Pom Poppers

Celebrate the last day in the most fun way students know how PARTY! Create these super exciting and fun pompom poppers for students to use when the bell rings or at the end of the day dance party! They will love it and you will love their excitement.

Learn More: Easy Kids Craft

19. This Year in Color

Have students make a picture highlighting all of their favorite things that happened in the past year. If your school allows candy, share skittles with students to give them some ideas of what colors to color their pictures.

Learn More: Digging Deeper Teaching Resources

20. Goodbye Stars

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Create each student their own star, you can write their names yourself or have them write them! Once their names are on their star, have students go around and write little notes to each other. This is something simple that they can take home and keep for years to come.

Learn More: Proud to be Primary

21. Dear Future Students

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Writing to the next students coming in will allow students to feel accomplished. Not only that they’ve finished the grade, but also that they’re ready to help the next ones in line. Keeping them humble and excited to share all of their great experiences.

Learn More: Teachers Pay Teachers

22. Rock, Paper Scissors Tournament

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It’s not just for the little kids. Kids throughout all grades will love to play in this tournament. Let them play in teams or individually.

Pro tip: Have multiple activities going during the tournament to keep busy ones engaged

Learn More: Session Lab

23. Find Someone Who

A little foreshadowing activity so students can see what their friends will be doing over the summer. This is a fun way to engage students in continuing their learning and friendships.

24. Coloring Page

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Sometimes the most simple assignments are the best assignments. This free coloring page is great for almost any grade. Whether you have it as extra work or an actual assignment, students will be engaged while decorating and reflecting on their year.

Pro tip: Have students create one of these at the beginning of the year and one at the end!

Learn More: Crayola

25. Friendship Books

Friendship books are great because they help students to reflect on their peers, while also receiving feedback on how they were as a friend. This is helpful to both help kiddos grow and to have a keepsake!

Learn More: 18 Adorable Children’s Books About Friendship

26. End of the Year Bubbles

Making bubbles together as a class is a mix of science and fun! Take your kiddos outside in the last few days and whip up some bubbles. Not only will this be fun for students, but it will also send them home with a fun activity to do this summer.

Pro tip: Have students record the recipe used to make the bubbles in order to make them at home.

Learn More: Primarily Speaking

27. Goal Setting for the Summer

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Summertime is full of excitement, warmth, and well, sometimes confusion. Taking kiddos out of their usual routine can have a pretty strong effect on their overall well-being. Help prepare your kiddos with some summer goal setting!

Pro tip: Easily create your own flip book by following this video.

28. Sidewalk Scoot

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Scoot is such a fun and engaging game, especially on a hot summer day at the end of the year. If you’re still trying to squeeze some standards in the last few days, bring in some sidewalk chalk and let the kids do the work.

Learn More: Apple for the Teach

29. Lemonade Tasting

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If your school allows drinks and snacks, then a lemonade tasting is the perfect end to a long year. Simply make a pink and yellow lemonade and have students decide which is their favorite! Use different charts that have been taught throughout the year to keep track.

30. End of the Year Mix

Are you always searching for that perfect playlist to play during end-of-the-year activities? This music will give you and your kiddos a great vibe to get through the last few days of the school year.

Learn More: Jack Hartmann Kids Music Channel

31. Read Aloud

If you’re behind on grading or need some time to get other activities ready, playing a read-aloud is the perfect way to keep your kiddos busy and still attentive. This book is perfect for exactly that and the narrator uses a great voice for students to follow along with!

Pro tip: You can choose to slow down the audio if the video is too fast for younger learners by clicking on the settings wheel and slowing down the speed of the video.

Learn More: Time 2 Read 2 Us

32. End of the Year Memory Video

Make your students their own little memory video! These videos are super easy to make and they make for an amazing keepsake both for the students, for you, and for parents.

Learn More: Mrs. Young’s Teaching Corner

33. Learn a New Song

Singing songs is really important in grades throughout elementary. This song was made for Kindergarten, but honestly, it can be used in any lower-elementary grade. Students will love to learn and sing this song in the last few days of school.

Learn More: Teacher Michael TV

34. Last Day Letters

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Create little bags for students to keep all of their last-day letters in. Start this activity by listening to or reading A Letter From Your Teacher on the Last Day of School   and then hand your letter to each student. Have students write each other letters.

Learn More: Life Between Summers

35. Last Day of School Brain Breaks

My students love these brain break activities. Usually, when they’re at lunch or recess I just move the desks out the way and then have the video ready for them when they get back. They’ll be super excited to follow along with the obstacles on the video.

Learn More: Now What? With Britt & Shawn

36. This or That

Playing this or that is so much fun in every class! This is great for any extra time you may find throughout the last few days. Rather than allowing students to just chat, play this video and even play along with them.

Pro tip: Follow this up with an activity about what students are most excited about this summer break! 

Learn More: PE with Coach Shockley

37. Riddles

Who doesn’t love guessing riddles? There are so many times in those last few days where there’s just not much learning left to be had. Thankfully, your students will love building these words! Let them write them on whiteboards or notebooks.

Learn More: 50 Riddles To Keep Your Students Engaged and Entertained!

39. Hot Seat

Hot seat is a perfect game for the end of the year! Whether you play inside or outside, your students will absolutely love playing this game. You could even choose a brave student and play at the school assembly.

Learn More: Games 4 ESL

40. Freeze Dance

Freeze dance, the end of the year style is great for kids of all ages. With Spongebob cartoons, students will love laughing along, while also getting ready for an intense mode of Freeze Dance!

Learn More: Coach Corey Martin

41. Ceramic Tile Art

This is fun with upper elementary and even middle school students. This is a great project that can be done inside or outside in the last few days of school.

Pro tip: Check a local thrift shop for ceramic tiles! 

Learn More: Jeff Tech Art

42. Why do We Have Summer Breaks? 

Colossal questions are some of the best videos out there for answering simple questions asked by students! This one is dedicated to understanding summer breaks. Before watching, ask students what they think.

Learn More: Colossal Cranium

43. Good Ol’ Dance Party

Well, there’s no better time to break out the disco lights than the last few days of school. This is the perfect soundtrack for a full-on dance party with all of your students!

44. Koo Koo Kanga Roo End of Day

By the end of the last day of the year, my kiddos are absolutely full of every single bean possible. They are ready to go and excited for the fun-filled summer ahead of them. This video helps everyone to get those sillies out at the end of the day!

Learn More: Steve Steve

45. End of the Year Discussion Wheel

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Finding ways to keep the conversation school-focused can be challenging when kids are so excited about all of their summer plans. Keep your community tight with this end-of-the-year discussion wheel!

Learn More: Worldwall

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classroom activities end of year

10:09 am By Proud to be Primary 11 Comments

Goodbye Stars: Last Day of School Activity for the Classroom or Online

This post details how to complete the perfect last day of school activity for your students. Even if you’re teaching online, this is a great activity to complete digitally! End of the year goodbye stars include writing meaningful goodbye messages on individual stars for each student. 

last day of school activity: end of the year goodbye stars

  • Create Goodbye Stars on the Last Day of School

The end of the year is a hectic and exhausting time for teachers. Students are finishing up projects and taking exams, while teachers are trying to cram every last thing into the limited time left. It is also time for those end of the year activities that bring everyone together for some fun.

End of the year goodbye stars is a great community-building activity that helps students further their social-emotional development. Saying goodbye is hard for some, and this helps them say it to their peers before summer vacation. It helps them reflect on past experiences and the year together as a class.

For online learners, this activity can be done independently at home with a few additional modifications and can serve as a beautiful memento of the school year.

Studentcanto share and write those memories and goodbye messages to their peers on stars. They build and strengthen relationships and good feelings this way. Completing the activity enhances writing and spelling skills. Most of all, goodbye stars make a wonderful keepsake at the end of the year.

Table of Contents

Cutting shapes, anchor chart activity, writing on the stars, digital goodbye stars activity, end of the year social-emotional learning resource, free summer reading booklet, more end of the year ideas, how to create goodbye stars as a last day of school activity.

For the star-shaped cut-outs, I recommend using a 2-ply weight paper or cardstock or scrapbook paper that is thicker than regular paper and not construction paper. Yellow makes the perfect color for stars and is light enough to show all ink colors. You could also get creative and use different scrapbook papers with fun prints.

last day of school activity: end of the year goodbye stars

Start by creating a tracer of a large star. The stars I use are approximately 12″ in diameter. Use the tracer to trace a class set of stars with a pencil. Cut out each star and write the names of each student in the center of each star. Don’t forget to create one for yourself and any other teachers in the classroom.

scrapbook stars cut out on table with markers

Start by brainstorming exercises to generate ideas. Create a “Goodbye Stars” anchor chart to record your words. Encourage students to think of positive messages about the different personalities in the classroom (i.e., You are nice!).

Come up with messages to wish someone well (i.e., Have a fun summer!). Think of favorite memories you have shared (i.e., Thanks for the help this year!). Once you have generated a chart full of messages, get ready for writing on each star.

last day of school activity: goodbye stars anchor chart of ideas

Completing this activity so that each student writes on each star requires a bit of organization. I recommend using small pieces of tape with arrows on each to put on each student’s desk. The arrow will point to where that student will pass their star next.

Make sure all students and teachers have a spot to sit with an arrow that points to a spot. Make sure that each spot will receive each star in turn. Have your students sit in their spots and look to where they will pass the stars next. Get them to give their stars to the first person.

last day of school activity: goodbye stars sample with written messages

Give the class a few minutes to autograph and write a personal message to that person. Request that students are neat and write with their best spelling and handwriting. Bring out your favorite markers, like these Crayola Skinny Markers for a variety of colors.

Once every student is ready and has written a thoughtful message on the star, you call “pass,” and they pass the star in the same direction to the next spot. Once each star comes back to its owner, the activity is complete.

last day of school activity: example of completed goodbye star

It is up to you as to what you do with the stars after or if you let your students take them home right away. I prefer to collect them and add them to the goodbye bags I create for students.

In the goodbye bag or basket, I include a letter from me, a summer activity, a goodbye star, a summer reading booklet , bubbles, and a special treat.

What is your favorite fun last day of school activity for students?

The goodbye star activity helps kids to reflect and say goodbye to friends together as a class. It’s been a popular activity in classrooms for years as a way to end the year on a positive note. Kids get to share and write memories and goodbye messages to their classmates on stars. They strengthen relationships and good feelings this way. Most of all, end-of-the-year goodbye stars make a wonderful keepsake.

I’ve provided a FREE digital resource you can use . That way, you can do it as a virtual writing activity in Google Classroom! Everyone will get a chance to sign (fill in a text box) on each classmate’s star.

classroom activities end of year

Here is the link to make a copy of the FREE google slides activity.

If you’re not sure how to do this virtually, I’ve created a quick tutorial video to help.

Click here to see how to use this google activity.

classroom activities end of year

Classroom Resources for the End of the Year

The end of the year social emotional learning resource is the perfect companion to your last few weeks of school lesson plans. It includes mini-lesson ideas, printable templates, and engaging activities that reflect on the connections made in the classroom.

classroom activities end of year

The SEL end of the year resource   and activities will encourage discussions amongst your kids about kindness, memories they’ve had throughout the year, friendships they’ve built, and goals they have for their future.

Download and print this summer reading booklet to encourage your students to read over the break. You can download it for FREE by clicking the image below.

Click here to subscribe

End of the School Year Activities

end of the school year activities

School Picture Mementos

last day of school activity: end of the year goodbye stars

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Reader Interactions

11 comments.

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Thank you for sharing this great idea! These end year stars are so great!

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Thanks Kirsten! Hope your class enjoys doing this activity!

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at 11:37 pm

I love this idea. This is a great way to scaffold their writing!

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Love this idea !! You mention you have a letter you sent with your goodbye to the students. What does this look like? Do you have one for parents?

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Do you have a pattern for the star? I don’t see a download or purchase link.

at 10:22 am

Hi Lucia! I actually used a paper cutout of a start. I traced it and cut out on yellow tag board. Hope that helps!

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Thank you for sharing this brilliant idea!

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How do students add their comments? Do I create one large text box for everyone? Or does each child create their own text box?

Each student creates their own text box or inserts their own image or shape. They can get creative

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What size star template did you use?

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at 10:43 am

As a Music Specialist teacher, I did a similar activity with my senior students. Since I only saw them twice a week, I asked them to share what they enjoyed learning the best that year and what they did not enjoy : so it was beneficial for me each year to plan music classes. At other times, I did the activity as you did and had them write about each other and we sat in a circle and passed their sheets around that I had prepared with their names in the middle in Calligraphy…they really did love this! It was a great way to finish our music classes for the year and before they graduated Elementary school!

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Teachers, are you looking for the perfect student keepsake for the end of the school year? Create something kids will cherish with the end of the year goodbye stars classroom activity!

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5 Fun Classroom Activities For End of Year That Will Delight Your Students

by | | Holiday Activities , Uncategorized

fun classroom activities for end of year

So you’re finishing up your school year. You have a little more flexibility with your classroom time. And you want to make things fun and memorable for your students. But it’s the end of the school year, you are exhausted and coming up with ideas and plans seems impossible. That is why I am here! I’m sharing 5 fun end of year classroom activities that my 2nd grade students love. 

Fun Classroom Activities For End of Year

Like I said before, at the end of the school year, we are end of the school year tired. That’s why you should consider doing activities that are all planned out for you. The less planning and decision making you need to do, the better!

If you are looking for something that is scheduled out for you, consider doing an ABC Countdown. This is where you plan an activity for the last 26 days of school. You start with A and do an activity that starts with A. For example, in my class we make paper airplanes. We watch a video explaining why different kinds of paper airplanes work. We fold paper airplanes and I have my students decorate them with markers. Then we go outside and I let my students run around on the playground and throw their planes around. They have an absolute blast! I love it because making paper airplanes doesn’t cost me any extra money.

I like to bring in some more excitement by having an ABC Countdown display. I post all of the letters on cards on our front whiteboard. On the back has the activity for the day. I call one students up a day to take down the letter and read what we are going to do. This builds anticipation. Students get so excited! Plus, they feel special when it is their turn to come take down the letter. I also like how it is a visual to how many days left of school we have.

fun classroom activities for end of year

Having a display for your fun classroom activities for end of year helps build anticipation with your students!

To be honest, the first year I did an ABC countdown it was pretty stressful. After a long day of teaching, it was hard coming up with a fun activity to do the next day. I spent long hours searching for ideas and getting supplies ready well past my contract hours. Plus, I had to find any videos or make any worksheets to go with it. My students love it! But for the next year, I decided I wanted to make things easier on me and other teachers like you!

So I made an ABC Countdown resource that has 4 ideas for each letter! Some activities you have everything you already need, some you need to buy materials. So pick one that is in your budget. Some activities could take 30 or more minutes, some just take a few minutes. So pick the activity that will fit in your time frame for the day. And don’t worry, all the worksheets you need for each activity are included. There are lesson plans for each ideas. So you don’t have to plan anything! It makes doing an ABC Countdown enjoyable for both students and teachers! Find my ABC Countdown resource here.

For more tips on doing an ABC Countdown, check out this blog post here: The Best Way to do an ABC Countdown in an Elementary Classroom

Now if you are not into doing an ABC Countdown, that is okay too! You can still do some fun classroom activities for the end of year. Just pick a few fun activities and do them with your class the last couple weeks of school. You don’t even need to do one everyday. Do what works best for you and your students. 

But I thought I would share some of the activities I do in my ABC Countdown that you could just do as fun end of year class activities.

Fun End of Year Classroom Activities

Dinosaur Fossils

One of my students’ favorite fun classroom activities for end of year is making dinosaur fossils. I have my students help me make salt dough. As the dough sets, I let them watch the dinosaur episode of Magic School Bus. Then afterwards, I give each student a small ball of salt dough. 

fun end of year activities for elementary

Students think these dinosaur fossils are so cool, making this one of the best fun end of year activities elementary students love.

Then they flatten it out and press a dinosaur counter into it. When they lift the dinosaur up, its shape is left behind and it looks like a fossil! You can let them dry out for a few days in your classroom. Or take them home and bake them in your oven. Find the recipe I use for the salt dough in my ABC Countdown resource. Find it here. Find the dinosaur counters I use here.

Shaving Cream

Have students play with shaving cream at their desks. I love this end of school year activity because it cleans students’ desks really nicely. I spray out shaving cream on each desk. Students smooth it down and can draw and write with it. I challenge students to draw things like a tree, the sun, a cat, or a flower.

Since 2nd graders are obsessed with cursive, I teach them a few cursive letters and they practice in the shaving cream. They love it! To help with the mess, I bring a couple hand towels. I wipe all the desks when they are done and they are sparkly clean. Also, the classroom smells so great afterwards.

Tie Dye Shirts

This fun end of year activity also counts as my end of year gift for my students. We make Tie Dye shirts one day. I buy a tie dye kit and white t-shirts for my students. At home, I write my students’ numbers on the tags, prewash the shirts, put the rubber bands on, and put them in a plastic bag. I write my students’ names on the bags.

At school, I have my students go out for an extra recess. I call over four students at a time and they tell me where they want each color. Then I put their shirt back in the bag to set. I also use a cooling rack over a cookie sheet that helps contain the mess.

fun end of year classroom activities

This is one of my favorite fun end of year classroom activities because it doubles as my end of year gift for students.

Later I’ll wash and dry them at home and they are ready for students. I give them to students on the 2nd to last day of school and then we all wear our tie dye shirts on the last day of school. It makes for a great class photo! Find the tie dye kits I use here and I t-shirts I use here.

Engineering Groups

For this activity, I like to have my students build things with fun supplies. Then they rotate through each group. My students build with notecards, popsicle sticks and binder clips, and make mazes with counting cubes and marbles. Students get so creative and have a blast! One of my students folded the notecards in half and lined them up to make a snake.

fun classroom games for the end of the year

Students can get so creative with these end of year fun activities for 2nd grade.

Others build full communities of notecard houses. Find more building ideas to do with your students in my ABC Countdown resource here.

Fun Classroom Games For The End of the Year

We all know students love games, so bring some classic games into your classroom as fun classroom activities for end of year. I play charades with my class. Each student gets a word to act out. The rest of the class guesses what they are acting out. There are a bunch of giggles and I love to see my students having fun. Find the charades cards I use in my ABC Countdown resource here.

You can also do variations of the game. For example, change it into Pictionary. Students get to draw their word up on the white board as the rest of the class guesses what their word is. So you could do it like headbands. Find the headbands game here.

You could also have a board game day. Students bring a game form home and you give them some time in class to play in groups. This is a great idea because it is no prep for you!

I hope you have been able to get plenty of ideas of fun end of year classroom activities. Use them in your elementary classroom to make those long end of year days a little shorter. Do the fun classroom activities for end of year that you have the time and energy to do. Get more even more fun end of year class activities here.

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10 EASY End of the School Year Activities

May 14, 2022 by Debbie Rudtke

classroom activities end of year

The end of the school year can be bittersweet, exciting, happy, sad, and more.  Those conflicting feelings and emotions add up to a CHALLENGE for teachers.  Let’s face it, teachers are tired at the end of the year, and when you are tired it is harder to be creative and have the necessary energy to keep students engaged.  I am here to help with ideas for end-of-the-school-year activities to keep your students engaged and having FUN.

I have a list of TEN super easy, no-prep, or low-prep activities to make the end of the school year FUN, keep students engaged and help teachers relax and have fun with their students.

#1: Go Outside

Get your class outside as often as possible at the end of the school year.  Fresh air and sunshine are naturally calming and a lot of students don’t get to spend much time outside.  You can go outside for an activity every day if the weather is nice!  What to do outside?

Read: Have a read “out”. Students bring their favorite book, a blanket, and find a comfortable spot to read.

Chalk Math: Have students write and solve math problems with each other or practice math facts on the sidewalk.

Picnic: Enjoy a snack or lunch outside.

Chalk Art: Have students get creative and have fun making the sidewalk beautiful.

Play a Game: play a whole class game such as “Red Light, Green Light”, “Duck Duck Goose”, or play kickball. Even older students would enjoy a quick, old-fashioned childhood game.

#2: Create a Summer Bucket List

Work together as a class to help each student create a list of 10 things they would like to do over the summer after the school year ends.  Brainstorm fun and simple ideas together such as:

Go to a park to play.

Visit with a friend from school.

Take a nap outside.

Visit the local library.

Ask a grownup to teach you how to cook a favorite food.

#3: Teach the Class

One of my favorite activities for the last week of school is to have students teach a lesson to the class. They can teach a math lesson, demonstrate an experiment, teach a song or a dance, share a special collection, how to play a video game, etc. Lessons are required to be “mini-lessons” and must only last 10 minutes or less. I let my students choose what they want to teach and they need to share that choice and have it approved by me.  I give them time in class to create a presentation in Google Slides and then I post a lesson “schedule” for the week.  My students LOVE sharing their expertise on a topic and I love watching them shine!

classroom activities end of year

#4: End of the School Year Doodle Contest

My students love to doodle so I love to use doodling as a fun classroom activity.

Simply pass out a blank piece of paper and let your students draw or doodle whatever they want!  When their doodles are done, students write their names on the back, I hang them up on a bulletin board and label the doodles with a number. I give my students some time to view the doodle gallery to select their favorite doodle and they vote for their favorite. 

#5: Create an End of the Year Classroom Playlist

I LOVE using music in the classroom and my students love it too!  Ask your students to write down their favorite song (it must be “clean” and classroom appropriate).  Take your students’ songs and compile a class playlist on YouTube.  Be careful to check all of the songs to make sure nothing inappropriate slips by.  Play your class playlist throughout the day.  Please note, that I do not recommend projecting the song videos but just the sound – you want to be on the safe side – you never know what might pop up!

classroom activities end of year

#6: Hold a Class Talent Show

Let your students’ talents shine by holding a class talent show!  Your students can dance, sing, show off a cheer routine, do a little stand-up comedy, a hand-stand, a soccer move, or something unexpected.  I let students choose to participate independently or with a partner or group. I do require them to share with me what they plan to do so that I can make sure that it is appropriate. Assign the activity to your students on a Friday and let them practice during the week for the class “show” on the following Friday. I allow students to use my classroom microphone and the projector if needed.

#7: Do a STEM/STEAM Challenge (or two!)

Image of a paper airplane on top of a paper with text "Paper Airplane STEM Challenge"

STEM challenges are collaborative, fun, and engaging.  And they are a great end of the school year activity since you have the luxury of more time.  Students can design and build:

  • paper airplanes that travel the farthest 
  • foil boats that hold the most pennies
  • the longest paper chain from a single sheet of paper
  •  a zipline that delivers a piece of candy

There are so many fun options to choose from!  You could have your students vote for the challenge of their choice or do a STEM Challenge day and do multiple challenges. If you need a simple STEM Challenge that uses only paper and tape, try one of my Simple STEM Challenges .

#8: Make a Graffiti Wall

Hang a large piece of butcher paper on the wall. Set up a container of markers.  Let your students write their names, draw pictures, jot down memories, just doodle, and have some fun creating a giant, collaborative, work of art.

#9: Remember the School Year

Image of a tablet with an "Our Class" yearbook page displayed.

It’s always fun to discuss and share memories of the school year.  Remember that fun field trip?  Or how nervous they were on the first day of school?  Collect all of these memories and gather photos from the school year to create a class yearbook! 

Read all about how I create a yearbook , How to Create A Digital Class Yearbook . 

You can also have students write advice for your next group of students. Your students can write all about the fun they had and the things that they learned with YOU. It would also be a great little note or booklet to leave on your new students’ desks on their first day of school next year. You can also check out my End of the Year Writing Booklet for a fun and easy activity.

#10: Clean and Organize

classroom activities end of year

Teachers have a lot to do at the end of the school year and students can help!  My students love to clean and organize the classroom so I let them.  I give pairs of students specific tasks and I keep a running list on our whiteboard.  Some things I have them do:

  • Go through all of the markers, test, and throw away the duds. Box up the good markers.
  • Ditto for glue sticks.
  • Organize the classroom library and weed out any books that don’t belong or are in need of repair.
  • Collect, count, and organize student textbooks.
  • Clean off student desktops making sure to peel off any tape residue.
  • Take down bulletin boards and anchor charts.
  • Organize leftover school supplies.
  • Sort and return student assignments.

I hope that you find this list helpful and EASY! Let me know in the comments if you try any of these ideas with your students.

End of the school year? No worries. You got this! Want more ideas? Check out my End of the Year Challenge !

For STEM challenge tips (plus a freebie), read my post, 5 Tips for Using STEM Challenges in Your Classroom .

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  • End of the Year

End of the Year Activities for Upper Elementary

By Mary Montero

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A gigantic list of engaging and meaningful end of the year activities for upper elementary students. Reading, writing, science, and more!

It’s here! It’s here! The end of the year is here!  Now, I always vacillate between being terribly sad the year is over and being so excited for a fresh start come August.  My first few years teaching, I always scrambled the last few weeks trying to find engaging but still meaningful activities for my students to do those last couple weeks of school.  I wanted it to be EXCITING and FUN, but I still wanted to maintain control of my classroom and keep them learning.  It was always a challenge.  I figure there must be other people in my same boat– searching endlessly for the perfect end of the year activity– so I compiled a huge list of the best end of the year activities (and books!) I have found and use every single year.

This compilation of end of the year activities is specifically geared towards keeping bigger kids (grades 3+) engaged the last few weeks of school.  I hope you can find an idea or two!

A gigantic list of engaging and meaningful end of the year activities for upper elementary students. Reading, writing, science, and more!

I shared this letter board image several years ago showcasing out last month of school activities. These were ALL activities we did from April onward that really kept the focus on academics, but students were having SO much fun. We did so many math projects (including the end of the year project I mention below), STEM sports from The Science Penguin, played games with task cards, and honed our math skills with Error Analysis.

A gigantic list of engaging and meaningful end of the year activities for upper elementary students. Reading, writing, science, and more!

Writing Activities

Memory boo k task cards.

I made these end of the year task cards years ago to use as our morning work during the last two weeks of school.  Each day, students picked a new task card to use to create a memory project for the school year.  Some cards took kids just one day to complete whereas others spent a good chunk of time on their task.  I always love the variety of displays I get  out  of these memory task cards! Update: This year, each student selected a memory task cards and created a page.  Then, we compiled each page into a book and turned it into an AMAZING end of the year memory book!   I have also updated this to include a digital version, which makes it SUPER easy to compile multiple students’ slides into one fantastic digital memory book for the end of the year.

end of the year memory book upper elementary

Three Words

I blogged about this Three Words idea years ago, and it remains one of my favorite end of the school year traditions.  We do this as an entire school and then make a big end of the year slideshow to watch as an entire school. When I moved to a school that didn’t have this specific school-wide tradition, we made it into an end of the year anchor chart instead.  So sweet. 

end of the year three little words memory activity

I can’t find an original source for this idea, but I love it!  Here is what the original pinner wrote: “ I created a basic newspaper template and then had my students write mini-articles on what the fifth graders can expect when they come to sixth grade next year. Students wrote a brief bio on about the teacher and then articles about tips to surviving sixth grade, favorite memories, sixth grade camp, etc. We then passed them along to the fifth graders so they could read them and get an idea for what sixth grade is about. This was a really fun activity!”  

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I know my students would be so excited about taking a field trip to their next grade , and they would be equally excited to host kids coming to 4th grade next year!  SUCH a brilliant idea.

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We always make an ABC book for one of our novels , so this would be a fun activity, too!  They can create a memory book based on their school year .   She  includes a free template and lots of other great end of the year ideas in this post, too!  

end of year literacy activities 7

Reading Activities

Fictional yearbook.

This End of the Year Reading Activity was created because my kids LOVE their yearbooks so much! I thought about creating a comprehension sheet to go with our yearbook, but then I realized how time intensive that would be and that I wouldn’t be able to use it from year to year.  So I created this fictional, 8-page yearbook with a super fun scavenger hunt to go with it.  It can be used in printable form (as shown), or you can make it into a center activity with the task cards that are included. 

end of the year yearbook scavenger hunt activity

Book Tasting

Described as book  speed dating, this activity could truly be used any time of year, but the end of the year– after all the books kids have read– would be the perfect time to host this book tasting party! I have blogged extensively about book tastings HERE .

Host2Ba2BBook2BTasting

Reading Centers

Engage your upper elementary students with these 6 high-interest End of the Year context clues reading activities that are fun and easy to prepare! No prep required, just print them out and use the context clues activities as literacy centers, or break them up into several engaging reading lessons that align to Common Core Standards!

end of the year context clues activities

For inference review, students will become investigators tasked with solving the ‘Case of the Mystery Pen Pal’ – finding clues and making inferences along the way with this set of end of the year inference centers .

end of the year inference center upper elementary

Plan a Fun Fest Reading Project

This project reviews reading, writing, and grammar skills ! Your students will dive into planning the perfect ‘Fun Fest’ in this activity that is rigorous and FUN! The “Fun Fest” theme makes it the perfect project to finish the school year. I included a wide variety of tasks for your students to complete with one goal in mind: to plan the best Fun Fest the school has ever seen!

upper elementary end of the year reading project

Reader’s Theater

My students absolutely LOVE reader’s theater, and these end of the year scripts are so fun! I set out to create a set of reader’s theater that helps students practice their reading comprehension skills, gives them plenty of opportunity for oral reading fluency practice, and provides accountability to both the readers and the audience.

upper elementary reader's theater scripts

Math Activities

Math project.

When I started creating math projects, I realized how engaged my students were with every new one that I pulled out.  That meant I needed one for the end of the year! I created this End of the Year Party Planner to review all of the math skills we had worked on but also to let their creative juices flow.  I always love seeing the games they come up with, how they lay out their field for the party, and more. 

end of the year math project upper elementary

Road Trip Math

This year, I had three weeks at the end of the year after I had finished all of our math standards.  I decided to pull out my Road Trip math project which I originally created to review skills at the beginning of the year.  It has been PERFECT for the last few weeks of school.  It reviews so many math skills, and I’ve been so impressed at the critical thinking my kids have shown.  Since it’s road trip themed, my students have really been getting in the summer mood, too! Keeping with the road trip theme, we also used these FREE road trip math task cards .  

end of the year math project summer activity

Steph from Teaching in Room 6 is one of my favorites– she has the most brilliant and engaging ideas for EVERYTHING and this end  of  the year math activity is no exception!   

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Science Activities

Airplane competition.

So, I will openly admit that I completely stalk The Thinker Builder.  He has amazing ideas, and this paper airplane one is no exception.  I can’t WAIT to do this activity this year.  I know the kids are going to flip out over it!

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STEM Sports

Our science kits are headed back to our district science center, so these STEM Sports challenges are PERFECT for  the  end of the year.  I plan to do these challenges the entire last week of school.   

stemsportspin

Dinosaur Fossils

Kelsey has some awesome ideas for keeping students engaged right until the very end.  Since we just finished our study of fossils, I know they would love these salt dough fossils !  

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Technology Activities

What a great collection of ideas for using the iPad at the end of the year !  She has included so many wonderful ideas. 

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If you have iPads in your room and a little bit of time, you absolutely MUST do this claymation project .  Seriously.  How cool is this!?

3418515 orig

Wrapping Up The Year

My VERY favorite end of the year activity happens in the last few minutes of the last day of school.  End  of the Year Awards! I start thinking about who will get what awards toward the middle of April and always have such a fun time choosing the perfect one.  As a result of having SO many different personalities over the years, my End of the Year Awards have grown into a HUGE bundle of more than 80 editable awards!  I truly can’t wait to hand these out.  

end of the year school staff and class awards

Future Plans

Have each student hold a dry erase board with what they want to be when they grow up .  Then, turn it into a bulletin board with their graduation year. What a GREAT send off for an entire grade level– especially 5th graders! (Source unknown)

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If you do portfolios, you HAVE to see this blog post.  They are some of  the  most gorgeous portfolios I have ever seen!

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End Of The Year Books

Here are a few Amazon affiliate links to books that are perfect for wrapping up the year.

Ten Beautiful Things Book Rec

Ten Beautiful Things : This is the perfect book to read as the school year is winding down. It encourages students to find the beauty all around them. This would offer fabulous extension opportunities, where you could encourage students to write their own list of ten beautiful things they see over the summer (or out the window!). The writing in this book is stunning, too!

On Account of Gum : This one checks the box for just a GOOD, FUN read aloud. Nothing too deep. Nothing too serious, just a funny book!

And Then Comes Summer : This is a sweet, sweet summer book to add to your book list! I love this one as a mentor text to have students write about their hopes and dreams for their summer… no matter how big or small!

A Camping Spree With Mr. Magee : Name a picture book you have read at least 20 times. For me, this one makes that list! Ever since it arrived on our doorstep a couple months ago, it has been ON REPEAT so often that my 3 year old has nearly memorized it and my 9 year olds are still eagerly cozying up with us every time I pull it out. You should definitely add this to your reading list over the last few weeks of school.

Looking for more end of the year activities?

Join us in our FREE Inspired in Upper Elementary Facebook group, where we’re always brainstorming and sharing the best ideas for students and teachers just like you!

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Mary Montero

I’m so glad you are here. I’m a current gifted and talented teacher in a small town in Colorado, and I’ve been in education since 2009. My passion (other than my family and cookies) is for making teachers’ lives easier and classrooms more engaging.

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classroom activities end of year

Professional Development

End of year activities.

You did it!  You made it through another amazing year of teaching!  I know you’re looking forward to summer break and you deserve it!  For now, you’re trying to hang on with everything you can to get through the last few weeks or days until that final bell.  I’m here to help!  I have tons of end of year activities for you to check out so you can enjoy the time you have left with your students!

End of Year Activities

Summer Themed Craftivity

End of Year Activity

This end of year activity is really easy to prep and super fun to make!  When you download the activity, you will find that it comes with a question page.  This you will want to display where all students can see or give each student a copy.  You can have the students pick and choose which pieces of the craft they would like to put into their ‘summer bucket’.  Have multiple copies (on white paper) of each piece in the front of the room and let students choose which they would like!  Then using the questioning guide, students will match the pieces they’ve chosen to the questions and answer them on their pieces!

It’s the perfect activity for the last week as it combines coloring, writing, and SUMMER!  Parents love seeing these come home and if you do them early enough, you can even display them as a final bulletin board in your classroom!

Let’s check out these other end of year activities!

End of Year BINGO

If your students are anything like mine, they have the wiggles, and BAD at the time of year!  They need to move and move often!  That’s why this End of Year BINGO game is perfect!  It allows students to spend time reminiscing about all of the amazing times you and your class had together!

End of Year Activities BINGO

As students walk around finding friends, encourage them to talk and discuss the memories rather than just moving on.  Even though it’s a BINGO game, it’s not a race!  Offer winners to everyone to gets a BINGO and maybe 2 or 3 BINGO’s!  The more questions asked, the better!

Here are some more end of year activities for you to check out!

End of Year Emoji Writing

End of Year Activities

This end of year emoji writing is super easy to prep AND it can be used as a game too!  The activity includes lots of emoji cards.  You will have the cards printed and in a pile with the students sitting on the floor in a circle around the pile of cards.  One at a time, have the students pull an emoji card from the pile and show it to the class.  Using that emoji, they must share a memory they have from the year that matches that emoji!  This game allows you all to truly talk and remember all of the amazing times you had together!

When you’re done with the game (or you can skip the game altogether) and you’re ready to write, have each student choose one emoji that they feel represents their year.  You have tons of options of writing paper included in the resource so have options printed and ready for your students.  Once chosen, they are to write about the memories they have of the class that match the emoji they have chosen.  You’ll love reading what they write and they can remember some really hilarious things that you probably have forgotten all about!

Let’s keep going on these awesome end of year activities!

End of Year 4 Corner Game

End of Year Activities

Here’s how you play End of the Year 4 Corners !  Once you have the technology set up and displayed, you will ask your students the question on the screen.  The questions are all summer related!  There are four choices.  Students will move to the corner of the room that matches the choice they want to pick.  Once there, they can talk with the other students in their corner about their answer.  Call on students to have them explain and give more detail to their answer and then continue onto the next question!

What’s even better about this game?  It’s editable!  So you have the ability to edit certain questions and answer choices to make the game work for you!  It’s so much fun and it’s a great way to spend some quality time moving around and reminiscing with your students.

End of Year Awards

End of Year Activities

Then I pair each award with a book that I know the students will love and hand them out as my End of Year Gift on the last day of school!  I had so many parents reach out to me saying how much they loved the gift and award.  It was something they would cherish for a long time.  Best idea ever!  If you’re looking for a fun last day of school autograph activity , come read about using beach balls to have students sign for each other!  So many end of year activities, so little time!

So with the end of the year here, I hope you found some awesome end of year activities to help get you through into summer.  And when summer finally arrives, ENJOY!

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End of Year Activities

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5 Fun End-Of-Year Classroom Activities

A teacher and students having fun doing some classroom activities.

It’s the end of the year and you want to do some fun classroom activities with your students before you take a break. Now is the perfect opportunity to reflect on the past twelve months and see how much your students have learned. It’s also a good time to revise vocabulary and enjoy practising language without spending a long time on complicated lesson plans.

Here are five quick and easy classroom activities that don’t need a lot of preparation.

1. Reflection road

This fun classroom activity is a wonderful way for students to reflect on their year of learning English. 

  • Students work individually, in pairs or in small groups. 
  • Have them draw a road that goes into the distance. The road should be big at the front of the page and become smaller at the top of the page. 
  • Give students sticky notes and ask them to write how they felt at the beginning of the year or term. You can ask questions to help them with ideas:

How confident did you feel speaking English?

How did you feel about your writing/reading/listening/speaking skills?

How was your pronunciation/vocabulary/grammar?

  • Students stick their notes on the distant part of the road. Then, ask learners to think about how they feel now. They repeat the task and stick their new notes on the front of the road. Learners share their journeys with a partner or with the class.  

2. Performance Pictionary  

This activity is a great way for students to practise and revise language whilst having fun in groups. 

  • Students work in small groups. Give students a topic you’ve studied through the year, for example, sports or personality adjectives. 
  • Each student in the group thinks of a word they know from that topic and writes it down. Tell them to make sure nobody else sees the word! 
  • Students take turns to act or draw their words for their group to guess. 
  • You can repeat the game several times with different topics. You could also have the class choose their own topics. 

3. Class collage

This end-of-year activity is a fantastic way to create a record of the year as a class. It can be done over several lessons.

  • This activity aims to create a large picture board of photos or drawings from the year. 
  • Tell students to collect photos or draw pictures of things they’ve learned throughout the year. For example, if they’ve studied countries and nationalities, they could bring in a picture of a flag. If they’ve studied places in a town, they could draw a picture of their hometown. 
  • You could also focus on your students’ hobbies and personalities. They bring in photos or draw pictures of things that represent them.
  • In the last class, put all of your students’ images together to create a big class collage.
  • With higher levels, learners could write descriptions of their images and stick them below each one. 

4. Quiz time

This fun classroom activity is led by students, so there’s no need for you to prepare anything. 

  • During the weeks before the end of the year, put learners into teams and have them write 10–15 quiz questions. They can look through their books and notes to write questions about things they’ve learned during the year. They can also write multiple-choice answer options. Questions should be difficult but not impossible!
  • In the final class, teams sit together and take turns reading their questions aloud. Other teams write down their answers.
  • Check answers as a class after each round.  
  • You could give a prize to the winning team, and also for the best team name! 

5. Future fun

This activity allows students to look forward to the future and take a break from their studies. Whether it’s summer or winter where you are, they’ll enjoy discussing holidays.

  • Put learners into pairs or small groups and have them discuss the things they would like to do during the holidays. These can be realistic ideas or invented ones. 
  • Be aware that holidays can sometimes be a sensitive topic for some students. If you feel it’s necessary, ask all learners to invent their dream holiday plans.  
  • Have each group plan short roleplays to show their holiday ideas. They create one roleplay for each member of the group. 
  • Put groups together and have them take turns acting out each roleplay. The other group must guess whose holiday plan it is. 
  • Groups collect points for each correct guess. The group with the most points at the end is the winner!  

When it comes to doing fun, end-of-year activities consider including activities that reflect on the year, practise language and look to the future like those above.

Do you have any ideas for fun, end-of-year classroom activities?

Share your lesson ideas with other teachers below! 

Join the Oxford Teachers’ Club for access to more free teaching resources.

For more quick activities, check out 5 Fresh Games For Teaching English – Using Dice!

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Thanks for sharing such useful information. Classroom activities is important part in learning. Lessons can be so boring for kids. So classroom activities is a good way to get distracted.

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11 Engaging End-of-Year Activities for Middle School ELA

11 engaging end of year activities for middle school ela

Counting down the days until the end of the year like your students? We’ve all been there. But it might be a sign that it’s time to rethink your approach to end-of-year activities. Consider these 11 activities to stay sane and keep students engaged through the last day of the school year.

It’s that time of year again…

These final weeks are often filled with high energy and sunny days—a dangerous duo that can turn any classroom upside down. Students are starting to get restless with the anticipation of summer. And, hey, teachers feel it too. However, we also face the challenge of keeping students engaged and focused until that final bell rings.

The good news? Those final weeks don’t have to be so painful or chaotic. If you’re looking for simple yet meaningful activities to fill up those last couple of days, I got you. Instead of ending the year fighting to hold students’ attention, you can focus on enjoying your last days together and celebrating all they learned throughout the year.

Read on to learn 11 end-of-year activities that will help you keep students engaged while maintaining a positive and productive learning environment.

Engaging Activities for End-of-Year Reflections

Reflection is an important part of the learning process, and it happens to be one of my favorite ways to close out the year. End-of-year reflections encourage students to close out the year on a positive note, highlighting the progress they’ve made over the year. It doesn’t hurt that they hardly require any planning, either. It’s a win-win.

Here are a few of my favorite activities to prompt end-of-year reflections:

1. Literary Yearbook

This activity puts an ELA spin on the traditional yearbook. As a class, create a literary yearbook that showcases students’ favorite books, characters, and memorable quotes from the year. Encourage students to include personal reflections on how these examples have impacted them. Students can design digital pages to create a virtual yearbook. Alternatively, take a more traditional route by having them create physical collages with images, text, and illustrations. It’s always fun to see what stood out to different students as you look back on the completed project.

2. Highlight Reel

What do students love more than being plugged in 24/7? Nothing. Play into their tech obsession by having them create an “Instagram” feed of their highlights from the year. Provide each student with a simple Instagram post printout. Then, let them design a post to reveal their favorite memorable moment, field trip, lesson, quote, novel, or character from class. Remind them to write a reflective caption and a fitting hashtag or two to complete the post. Hang all of the “posts” on the wall to put your classroom highlight reel on full display!

3. Author’s Chair

Why should you be the only one who gets to enjoy student writing? End the year by celebrating students’ writing by hosting an Author’s Chair session. Invite students to share an excerpt from their favorite pieces of writing with one another. Encourage them to select a piece they are particularly proud of or one that demonstrates their growth as a writer. Each student can read their chosen passage aloud, followed by a brief reflection on their writing process and why they are particularly proud of this piece. Give peers a moment to compliment one another’s work before moving on to the next author. This activity gives students an opportunity to celebrate their writing achievements, as well as the achievements of their peers.

4. Letter to My Past Self

While writing a letter to one’s future self is a popular end-of-year activity, I recommend encouraging them to look back and celebrate how far they’ve come. In this activity, students have an opportunity to reflect on their growth, experiences, and lessons learned throughout the school year. It provides a unique opportunity for students to practice self-reflection, celebrate their achievements, and offer advice to their younger selves. They can write about the books they’ve read, the writing assignments they’ve tackled, the obstacles they’ve overcome, and the skills they’ve developed.

It may be useful to provide guiding questions or prompts to help students get started:

  • What are the most memorable lessons or activities that impacted you this year?
  • What challenges did you face, and how did you overcome them?
  • What achievements are you most proud of from this year?
  • What advice would you offer to your past self to navigate this school year successfully?

Literature-Focused End-of-Year Activities

Another way to engage students until the end of the year is to incorporate literature-inspired projects and activities. These activities help celebrate the books students have read while also providing opportunities for creativity and critical thinking. Whether your students have spent the year reading novels or short stories, as a class or independently, you can find fun and engaging activities to help highlight their literary achievements.

Here are a few of my favorite literature-focused end-of-year activities:

5. Single-Sentence Text Summaries

Single-sentence text summaries are a quick and engaging way to recap the texts students have read over the course of the year. Start by working as a class to make a list of all the texts you read in class over the year. Include everything from novels to short stories. Then, have each student write a single-sentence summary for one of the titles from the list. Have students take turns sharing their summaries with the class, letting their peers guess which title they are summarizing. Repeat this process for a few rounds until all titles have been summarized at least once. Worried about students summarizing the same text? That’s actually part of the fun. It’s a great opportunity to pause and discuss the differences and similarities between summaries for the same text.

6. Literature Review Playlist  

The Literature Review Playlist activity combines literature and music to create an engaging way for students to reflect on the books they have read over the year. Have students select 10 pieces of literature, including novels, short stories, and poems, they read this year. Then, have them create a playlist where each song represents a different text they have read. Students should select songs that they feel connect to the plot, theme, characters, conflicts, or overall mood of each book. For a more robust version of this activity, require students to provide explanations or short descriptions for each song, highlighting the specific elements of the text it represents. This activity can work for both assigned texts and independent reading. Either way, this activity is always a hit (pun fully intended).

7. Student-led Book Tasting

A student-led “Book Tasting” is an engaging and interactive way for students to share their favorite independent reading books from the year with their peers. On the day of the tasting, have each student bring in their chosen book to share with their peers. However, instead of presenting their book, students will be encouraged to walk around the room, “tasting” different books by looking at the cover, reading the back synopsis, and skimming through the first several pages or chapters. As students “taste” the different books, encourage them to jot down the titles that piqued their interest. This activity allows students to discover new books and expand their reading horizons right in time for summer reading. How perfect!

If you’ve never hosted a book tasting in your classroom, I recommend starting with this post.

End-of-Year Activities for Vocabulary Review

If you take the time to teach vocabulary throughout the year, it’s worth taking the time to review it at the end of the year, too. Whether you incorporate vocab review ahead of a final exam or as a fun activity in the final days before summer, these activities will ensure your vocabulary review is anything but dull and monotonous.

Engage your students with one of these interactive end-of-year vocabulary review activities:

8.  Vocab Relay Race

Who doesn’t love a little healthy competition? For this relay-style activity, start by creating stations around the classroom with vocabulary-related activities. Activities can include word definitions, visual representations, synonyms, antonyms, fill-in-the-blanks, or use of words in sentences. When you’re ready to begin, divide the class into teams of 2-3 students. Each team must complete the activity at one station before moving on to the next. However, they must get your stamp of approval on their answer before officially moving on. The first team to complete all stations wins!

9. Vocab Charades

Charades is a classic favorite—and a great way to review vocabulary at the end of the year. The best part? It’s fun, engaging, and effective without much planning. Simply write vocabulary words on index cards and have students take turns acting out the word without speaking while their classmates guess. Depending on the group and the volume of words, feel free to let students use their notes during the game. Note or no notes, this activity promotes collaboration and critical thinking. If you plan on using vocab charades as a way to review vocabulary from the entire year, I recommend giving students 5-10 minutes to review the terms before starting to play. Trust me, this will help you avoid a lot of blank stares.

10. Vocab Bingo

Vocab Bingo is a fun and engaging game that helps students review and reinforce their knowledge of vocabulary words from the year. Start by choosing your set of vocabulary words. Then, create bingo cards with vocabulary words instead of the traditional number setup. Just be sure to mix up the words on each card. Call out definitions while students mark the corresponding word on their cards. You can also include synonyms, antonyms, or examples to mix it up. Keep going until a student gets BINGO! After a few rounds, price it up by requiring special winning patterns, like four corners or a full blackout of all squares.

Fun End-of-Year Activities for Middle School ELA

Last but not least… (because who doesn’t love to be recognized for their strengths?)

11. End of Year Award Ceremony

The end of the year is the perfect time to recognize your students for all their hard work! I mean, grades are great and all, but they are only one way to reward students for a job well done. Besides, there are so many things standard grades don’t capture. For example, grades don’t always do justice to how students treat one another or how they add to the overall classroom culture. Consider including awards that recognize students for things like collaboration, kindness, and creativity, too. Whatever specific awards you choose to include, hosting an awards ceremony will ensure you end the year on a positive note.

Trust me. I know how exhausting the end of the year can be. However, as the school year winds down, I encourage you to incorporate engaging end-of-year activities where possible. These types of activities can tap into students’ creativity while providing opportunities for critical thinking, collaboration, and self-reflection—-and help make those last weeks of school more enjoyable for everyone .

So, don’t be afraid to let your creativity shine as you plan exciting end-of-year activities—or simply steal some of the fun ideas above.

If you have any other engaging end-of-year activities to add to the list, please share them in a comment below. Here’s to making the most of those final weeks!

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8 Fun End Of The Year Activities For ESL Students

  • by charlielesson
  • April 2, 2022 December 8, 2023

8 Fun End Of The Year Activities For ESL Students

Hello and welcome back to Charlie’s Lessons – thank-you for reading my blog throughout the school year. I know that it has been a long year for many of us. But it wouldn’t be fair for you or your students to finish it with a whimper, so this blog is all about finishing the year with a bang!

My name is Charlie – I am an English teacher and have been teaching English as a foreign language for over 12 years. I currently work as Director of Studies at a local language school here in Southern Spain. I made this blog series to help other English teachers to help improve their lessons using the latest digital technology for education. But also, to share some of my favourite classroom ideas that I have learned in the course of my teaching career.

Here I’m going to run through 8 of my favourite end of school activities to help you conclude the year on a high note with your class. These are activities that I have used with my students in previous years, but also ones that I’ve borrowed and come highly recommended by my fellow ESL teachers.

Fun Activity 1: Best Memories Or Moments

For this activity, we can ask our students to think back over the previous year and remember their most memorable moments. We can make this activity even more positive by changing the word from memories to best moments. I usually give my students Post-It notes and a pen, as well as a writing prompt such as: “I remember when…”

This is great for practising writing skills as well as past tenses. It can usually be followed by the past simple, but you can also introduce the past continuous. Students could say for example, “I remember when… we were doing a reading activity in class and Pedro farted !” Yes, this did really happen in one of my classes once.

Once you have all of the students with their completed Post-It notes, you can put them on the whiteboard for the end of the year. You can also collect the pieces of paper using a memory bag. Or you could take a photo of the memory and send it to your students at the end of the year to remind them. Alternatively, you can use Google Jamboard if you are working remotely or want to be paperless.

Fun Activity 2: A Letter To Our Future Selves

In our first activity, we were looking at the past. But for our second activity, we are going to look at the future. So, for our next fun activity to end the school year, we can ask our students to write a letter to themselves for the same time the following year.

For weaker students, we can give them a clear structure on how to write their letter in English. We can also restrict them to the simple future tenses, such as ‘like’, ‘will’, ‘going to’ and the present continuous.

We can then address each letter to each student and send it to them for the next time they have to do an end of year activity. This is a great way for them to reflect and think about how far they have come in that year.

Before you say goodbye to your students, why don’t you recommend some self-study tools right here?

Fun Activity 3: The Classroom Oscars

This is similar to a certain fun awards ceremony for the entire classroom. You provide the awards and they provide the speeches. How you wish to allocate the awards depends on your relationship with your students and the relationships between your students. If you are going to award them for skills then you have to be careful about the reaction that this may produce.

So, if I am putting together awards for skills then I usually award the entire class. If I am creating individual awards, then I would normally choose silly categories like the most punctual, sleepiest, happiest, giggliest, and so on. This is so that the little things do not feel too important and we can encourage fun or silly speeches.

If it’s not the end of year and you want some fun activities for the classroom anyway, check out this post here.

Fun Activity 4: Quiz The Book

Activity idea number four is what I call ‘Quiz The Book’, whereby we take a student’s coursebook and set them challenges. A lot of the course books that our students use will include images or text inside that we can incorporate here.

So, using this information, we could ask the students:

  • What colour is the man’s T-shirt on page 44?
  • Can you use the first words on pages 12, 34 and 67 to create a sentence?
  • Can you provide a synonym of [a word] on page 16? The students then search page 16 for that synonym, e.g. the word ‘beautiful’.

This can be set up as a race within the classroom, with the first student to correctly complete their sentence becoming the winner.

Fun Activity 5: One Day At A Time

For this activity, we look at the calendar and how many days are left in the class until the end of the year. We then look at how many students there are and dedicate one day of the remaining school year to each of our students. So, if you have 15 students in your class you can dedicate the final 15 days of the year to each student.

You should find out what each student loves to do the most in your class by speaking to them individually rather than as a group. This is so that they don’t feel pressured by the rest of the classroom and they can fully enjoy their appointed day for this activity.

Fun Activity 6: Fancy Dress

This activity is fun, easy to prepare for and great for all age groups. First, we have a class vote on which theme we would like to celebrate that the end of the year. We can give our students a selection of themes that we prefer and can easily prepare for. We can then put the options to a vote and once everyone agrees, we can ask our students to come to class in that theme of fancy dress for that day.

We can also:

  • Create a themed music playlist
  • Prepare theme-related quizzes
  • Prepare some fun themed games
  • Find a TV series or a film that relates to the theme

Even though this is great fun for all ages, you can still expect some complaints from the less enthusiastic students who don’t like dressing up. So, you can expect something like this: “Who actually voted for this theme anyway?” “What’s that? What did Charlie say? He said it was the easiest to prepare for? Okay!”

Fun Activity 7: Summer Holidays

In our 2nd activity, we wrote a letter to our future selves. But activity 7 is more designed for the immediate future. So, when the summer holidays are nearing, I like to give the students an imaginary budget to plan their dream holidays.

This could be absolutely anything that they imagine. But their budget should take into account flights, hotels, restaurants and activities that they may wish to do during their dream holiday. The group that spends the least amount, or has the best ideas wins.

In another one of my blogs, I also use this holiday planning idea in conjunction with the brilliant digital teacher training tool Padlet . So, if you have a virtual class or students with access to digital devices you will find it very useful and can check it out here too.

Fun Activity 8: Paper Aeroplanes

This is a really simple activity that doesn’t require a lot of preparation at all. All you need is some plain paper and instructions for your students on how to build the most common paper aeroplane designs. We can then challenge the students by asking them specific questions such as: “How long does the aeroplane stay in the air?” Or, we can set everyone a challenge to see who can make the best-designed aeroplane that stays in the air for the longest. Or we can ask everyone to attempt to make the most beautiful aeroplane.

Well, there we have my 8 fun end of school year activities and ideas. As the school year winds down, why not try out a couple of these great activities in your next ESL class?

If you have any funny stories or recommendations from when you tried these activities to end the school year in your classroom, feel free to share them with me in the comments below.

If you have some free time over the summer, then get prepared for the new academic year by reading my post on back to school ideas.

If you do use these activities, I hope that you enjoy them as much as my classrooms and I have done. Thanks for reading and I’ll see you next time!

EU AI Act: first regulation on artificial intelligence

The use of artificial intelligence in the EU will be regulated by the AI Act, the world’s first comprehensive AI law. Find out how it will protect you.

A man faces a computer generated figure with programming language in the background

As part of its digital strategy , the EU wants to regulate artificial intelligence (AI) to ensure better conditions for the development and use of this innovative technology. AI can create many benefits , such as better healthcare; safer and cleaner transport; more efficient manufacturing; and cheaper and more sustainable energy.

In April 2021, the European Commission proposed the first EU regulatory framework for AI. It says that AI systems that can be used in different applications are analysed and classified according to the risk they pose to users. The different risk levels will mean more or less regulation. Once approved, these will be the world’s first rules on AI.

Learn more about what artificial intelligence is and how it is used

What Parliament wants in AI legislation

Parliament’s priority is to make sure that AI systems used in the EU are safe, transparent, traceable, non-discriminatory and environmentally friendly. AI systems should be overseen by people, rather than by automation, to prevent harmful outcomes.

Parliament also wants to establish a technology-neutral, uniform definition for AI that could be applied to future AI systems.

Learn more about Parliament’s work on AI and its vision for AI’s future

AI Act: different rules for different risk levels

The new rules establish obligations for providers and users depending on the level of risk from artificial intelligence. While many AI systems pose minimal risk, they need to be assessed.

Unacceptable risk

Unacceptable risk AI systems are systems considered a threat to people and will be banned. They include:

  • Cognitive behavioural manipulation of people or specific vulnerable groups: for example voice-activated toys that encourage dangerous behaviour in children
  • Social scoring: classifying people based on behaviour, socio-economic status or personal characteristics
  • Biometric identification and categorisation of people
  • Real-time and remote biometric identification systems, such as facial recognition

Some exceptions may be allowed for law enforcement purposes. “Real-time” remote biometric identification systems will be allowed in a limited number of serious cases, while “post” remote biometric identification systems, where identification occurs after a significant delay, will be allowed to prosecute serious crimes and only after court approval.

AI systems that negatively affect safety or fundamental rights will be considered high risk and will be divided into two categories:

1) AI systems that are used in products falling under the EU’s product safety legislation . This includes toys, aviation, cars, medical devices and lifts.

2) AI systems falling into specific areas that will have to be registered in an EU database:

  • Management and operation of critical infrastructure
  • Education and vocational training
  • Employment, worker management and access to self-employment
  • Access to and enjoyment of essential private services and public services and benefits
  • Law enforcement
  • Migration, asylum and border control management
  • Assistance in legal interpretation and application of the law.

All high-risk AI systems will be assessed before being put on the market and also throughout their lifecycle.

General purpose and generative AI

Generative AI, like ChatGPT, would have to comply with transparency requirements:

  • Disclosing that the content was generated by AI
  • Designing the model to prevent it from generating illegal content
  • Publishing summaries of copyrighted data used for training

High-impact general-purpose AI models that might pose systemic risk, such as the more advanced AI model GPT-4, would have to undergo thorough evaluations and any serious incidents would have to be reported to the European Commission.

Limited risk

Limited risk AI systems should comply with minimal transparency requirements that would allow users to make informed decisions. After interacting with the applications, the user can then decide whether they want to continue using it. Users should be made aware when they are interacting with AI. This includes AI systems that generate or manipulate image, audio or video content, for example deepfakes.

On December 9 2023, Parliament reached a provisional agreement with the Council on the AI act . The agreed text will now have to be formally adopted by both Parliament and Council to become EU law. Before all MEPs have their say on the agreement, Parliament’s internal market and civil liberties committees will vote on it.

More on the EU’s digital measures

  • Cryptocurrency dangers and the benefits of EU legislation
  • Fighting cybercrime: new EU cybersecurity laws explained
  • Boosting data sharing in the EU: what are the benefits?
  • EU Digital Markets Act and Digital Services Act
  • Five ways the European Parliament wants to protect online gamers
  • Artificial Intelligence Act

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How Social Media May Benefit Teens’ Mental Health

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We hear a lot about how social media is terrible for teenagers’ mental health. A growing number of laws and lawsuits point the finger at social media companies as playing a major role in driving the youth mental health crisis.

Among the many common criticisms: Social media invites unhealthy comparisons with peers that leave users feeling inadequate and dissatisfied with their lives. The platforms are addictive and teens use them at the expense of personal relationships, schoolwork, and sleep. Social media bombards impressionable minds with false and disturbing information. And, finally, critics say it provides another avenue for bullies to terrorize their victims.

But those issues make up only one side of the coin, said Chelsea Olson, who works at the University of Wisconsin as a researcher in the pediatrics department and is a member of the university’s Social Media and Adolescent Health Research Team.

“There’s both benefits and risks of social media,” Olson said, as there are for most activities teens engage in.

To learn more about how social media can benefit teens’ wellbeing—especially for certain groups of kids—Education Week spoke with Olson by phone. This conversation has been edited for length and clarity.

What do you see as some of the biggest benefits to teens and adolescents using social media?

021624 chelsea olson BS

Two that I often mention are social connection and social support. [Social media] allows youth to connect with people near and far, create friendships, maintain those friendships, stay in touch with family who live far away. And then they can also participate in larger networks based on interests, such as fandoms.

And then social media offers a venue for social support: Seeking social support and receiving that on social media has been found to alleviate depressive symptoms and, and help teens feel better about themselves. Facebook has support groups; often there’s anonymous groups through Reddit, et cetera.

Then another one is that social media just offers so many learning opportunities and information-seeking opportunities. Teens can seek information about their own relationships, like [with] peers or families. They can seek health information, information about their identity, information for school. It’s a really cool venue to seek information.

Other benefits that we [researchers] talk about:

  • Creative expression. Teens can express themselves creatively through posts and photos, sharing art, music, et cetera.
  • Civic engagement. It allows teens to be involved in civic duties and practice those civic duties online and be involved in advocacy and activism and raising money and encouraging or getting involved in the political process.
  • And then, identity development. Allowing teens to engage in identity tasks that they’re already going through. Because in adolescence they’re developing a coherent sense of identity that’s separate from others and their parents. They can use social media to work on those tasks so they can showcase or explore parts of themselves and get feedback from others. I don’t know if safe is the right word that I’m looking for, but like a safer space to express oneself and get some feedback.

In some contexts, it could be a safer space. Talk to me about LGBTQ youth, because I think that’s probably a really good example of this.

So obviously LGBTQI+ youth face a number of challenges like stigma, discrimination. They are at a higher risk for experiencing bullying. They also might experience safety issues or hostile environments at home, in the school. And because of all of those things, they report higher mental health distress. And so social media is a way that they can find community, they can connect with others, they can learn about themselves, they can seek resources online. Social media can actually be like a lifeline for these youth, especially if they’re experiencing those negative things in person.

It could also be youth with chronic illnesses, especially illnesses that are rare or complicated. They might be able to go find others who are experiencing the same thing, getting that peer connection or peer support on social media, joining support groups, accessing information about their illness that they may not be able to find elsewhere.

Another one is youth who are socially anxious about interacting in person can use social media and the internet to practice those skills.

A counter argument you’d hear to that is: “Well, they need to get offline and get over it and build those skills in the real world.” How would you respond to somebody who says that?

Research has found that adolescents who aren’t socially anxious, who have really rich social communities offline, tend to take those communities online where they augment their offline communities. It’s kind of like the rich get richer, where they’re already succeeding offline and they take those interactions online and only strengthen them.

Research has also shown that socially anxious kids, ones that are struggling offline, can go online and practice those skills and then hopefully take them offline as well.

What do educators need to be doing to help kids reap these benefits of social media while avoiding the risks?

Modeling [positive social media use] is really important.

A really cool resource is Common Sense Media . They have specifically for educators a curriculum that’s free to use and research-backed.

Another resource is the American Academy of Pediatrics’ family media plan . Families can develop plans with teens and set those boundaries. Involving youth and their thoughts and perspectives and ideas is really important because if we involve youth, they’re more likely to follow those boundaries or goals.

I think media literacy, digital citizenship skills would be really important to add to curriculum in schools, just because social media is here to stay. Teaching those things early and ensuring that teens have those tools and skills would be essential to ensuring that they’re using technology positively in the future.

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It’s Leap Year! Here are fun facts, activities, TV episodes, ‘pirates’ to celebrate

  • Updated: Feb. 21, 2024, 1:46 p.m. |
  • Published: Feb. 21, 2024, 1:35 p.m.

Urban Air Adventure Park opens in Westlake, April 2, 2022

Celebrate getting an extra day this leap year by taking a leap at Urban Air Adventure Park in Westlake, or other indoor trampoline parks in the area. Leap Day is Thursday, Feb. 29. Joshua Gunter, cleveland.com

  • Julie Washington, cleveland.com

CLEVELAND, Ohio — Your year is about to get one day longer. Thursday, Feb. 29 is leap day, the day inserted into the calendar every four years to keep our calendar operating smoothly. This extra day makes the year 366 days long, instead of 365 days like regular years.

Curious about why we have one extra day stuck to the end of February every four years? Here are several fun facts about leap years and leap days. This information was found on USA Today, People.com , Good Housekeeping, Timeanddate.com , Thoughtco, and the Old Farmer’s Almanac. Click the links to learn more.

Why add a leap day? Leap days are needed to keep our calendar in alignment with the Earth’s revolutions around the Sun.

It takes the Earth approximately 365.242189 days - or 365 days, 5 hours, 48 minutes, and 45 seconds - to circle once around the Sun. This called a tropical year. Without an extra day on Feb. 29 nearly every four years, we would lose almost six hours every year. After only 100 years, our calendar would be off by approximately 24 days.

Hail Caesar: Julius Caesar introduced the first leap year around 46 B.C., but his Julian calendar had only one rule: Any year evenly divisible by four would be a leap year. That created too many leap years, but the math wasn’t tweaked until Pope Gregory XIII introduced his Gregorian calendar more than 1,500 years later.

There’s a leap year every year that is divisible by four, except for years that are both divisible by 100 and not divisible by 400. The year 2000 was a leap year, but the years 1700, 1800 and 1900 were not. The added rule about centuries (versus just every four years) was an additional fix to make up for the fact that an extra day every four years is too much of a correction, according to ScienceWorld.

But the Egyptians did it too: Julius Caesar may have gotten the idea for leap days from the Egyptians. By the third-century BCE , Egyptians followed a solar calendar that spanned 365 days with a leap year every four years.

Leap months in other countries: A whole leap month is added to the Chinese calendar every three years. The leap month’s place in the Chinese calendar varies from year to year, and 2015 was a leap year in the Chinese calendar.

A leap year in the Ethiopian calendar occurs when an extra day is added to the last month of the year every four years.

Leap year traditions: It’s acceptable for a woman to propose to a man on Feb. 29. The custom has been attributed to St. Bridget, who is said to have complained to St. Patrick about women having to wait for men to propose marriage. Patrick supposedly gave women one day to propose.

Leap year babies : People born on leap day are often called “leaplings” or “leapers.” Most celebrate their birthday on Feb. 28 or March 1 on non-leap years.

There’s a leap year club : The Honor Society of Leap Year Babies is a club for people born on Feb. 29. More than 11,000 people worldwide are members.

And a leap year movie: Amy Adams and Matthew Goode starred in the 2010 romcom “Leap Year.” It’s about a woman who travels to Ireland to ask her boyfriend to accept her wedding proposal on leap day, when tradition says that men cannot refuse a woman’s marriage proposal.

And leap year TV episodes: Some TV shows have found comedy in building episodes around the birthday-related predicaments of leaplings, including Cam (Eric Stonestreet) on “Modern Family” and Sue (Eden Sher) on “The Middle.”

There’s even a musical: In “The Pirates of Penzance,” Frederic was born on Feb. 29, 1856, and thought he was apprenticed to a band of pirates until he turned 21. However, his apprenticeship is until his 21st birthday, when he’ll be 84 years old. It’s all explained in the song “Leap Day Paradox,” and several versions can be found on YouTube.

Leapin’ fun: Celebrate your bonus day by making origami jumping frogs, writing a letter to your future self or creating a family time capsule to be opened on a future Leap Day. Or catch air at a local trampoline park such as Urban Air Adventure Park in Westlake, or Sky Zone in Highland Heights and Westlake.

Leap year capital : The twin cities of Anthony, Texas, and Anthony, New Mexico, are the self-proclaimed Leap Year Capital of the World. They hold a four-day leap year festival each leap year that includes a huge birthday party for all leap year babies.

Famous leapers : If you were born on leap day, you share a birthday with the composer Gioacchino Rossini, motivational speaker Tony Robbins, jazz musician Jimmy Dorsey, actors Dennis Farina and Antonio Sabato Jr., and rapper/actor Ja Rule.

Leap years in history: During leap years, George Armstrong Custer fought the Battle of the Little Bighorn (1876), the Titanic sank (1912), Benjamin Franklin proved that lightning is electricity (1752) and gold was discovered in California (1848).

Leap into the future: The next leap years will be in 2028, 2032 and 2036.

Julie Washington covers healthcare for cleveland.com . Read previous stories at this link .

Julie Washington

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House Republicans’ education bill rejected as lawmakers continue work toward bipartisan deal

classroom activities end of year

Rep. Andy Josephson, D-Anchorage, speaks in support of a $350 million annual boost to the state's school funding formula, matching a figure supported by education advocates in Juneau on Wednesday, Feb. 21, 2024. (Sean Maguire / ADN)

JUNEAU — The Alaska House is striving for a bipartisan education deal after a sweeping Republican-backed package failed to garner enough votes to be debated on the floor.

Twenty House Republicans on Wednesday voted in favor of hearing the education bill, which had several key provisions proposed by GOP Gov. Mike Dunleavy. Twenty other representatives voted against debating the proposal.

Wednesday’s vote was identical to Monday’s vote tally for the same procedural motion. But the second failed vote meant all the GOP-backed provisions in the bill were effectively removed, including plans for more charter schools; $40 million in extra funding for homeschooled students; and $58 million in teacher bonuses. Those provisions could be added back into the final House education package through amendments.

Over the two days between the two failed procedural votes, legislators held multiple closed-door meetings to craft a deal.

“We’ve taken a couple of days to have some conversations to try to come together with some kind of a bipartisan agreement. Those have not come to fruition yet,” said House Speaker Cathy Tilton, a Wasilla Republican, after a marathon day on the House floor that ended just before 10:30 p.m.

“We don’t have a deal at this time, but obviously we still have an opportunity to keep working towards the solution,” said Anchorage independent Rep. Calvin Schrage, the House minority leader, late Wednesday evening.

The now-rejected Republican education package came with a $300 boost to the Base Student Allocation — the state’s per-student funding formula — at a cost of $77 million per year. Education advocates have said a school funding boost five times that size is needed after six years of virtually flat school funding and high inflation.

classroom activities end of year

Legislators from the House and Senate met behind closed doors over the past two days, trying to craft an education deal. Independent Anchorage Rep. Calvin Schrage walks out of the House Speaker's chambers with Sen. Bill Wielechowski, D-Anchorage, and Rep. Louise Stutes, R-Kodiak, from a Tuesday morning meeting in Juneau (Sean Maguire/ADN)

A second procedural vote on Wednesday to debate an earlier version of the education package failed, which meant the bill reverted to how it looked when it left the Senate: a one-page measure to allow eligible schools across Alaska to apply for grants to increase their internet download speeds.

Lawmakers have been racing to pass an education package with those internet provisions by the end of the month. School districts need to submit applications for broadband grants by Feb. 28 or they could miss out on substantial funding over the fiscal year that starts in July.

Members of the House minority had objected to provisions they said were unvetted in the Republican package added last month by a legislative committee that only typically schedules when bills are heard by the full House.

Anchorage Republican Rep. Craig Johnson, co-chair of the House Rules Committee, said after the second failed vote Wednesday that he was not disappointed that the GOP-backed bill had not advanced to floor debates and it was all part of the process.

Amendment debates to the one-page broadband bill started after 5 p.m. Wednesday.

A succession of amendments was introduced by minority members to substantially increase the BSA, but all were rejected by one-vote margins. Wasilla Republican Rep. David Eastman was the swing vote each time, joining 20 members of the GOP-led majority to vote down each proposal.

Schrage said he was not surprised by Wednesday’s vote tallies. He said it was accurate to say the House was effectively in a holding pattern while discussions continued behind closed doors to forge a deal.

Democrats and independents from the minority have favored a BSA boost of at least $680 at a cost of $175 million per year. They spoke on the House floor about the potential impacts of not approving a substantial school funding increase this year. Schools are slated for closure in Juneau and Fairbanks; class sizes are set to increase; popular school programs would be cut; and teacher positions would be eliminated, lawmakers said.

Rep. Zack Fields, D-Anchorage, said a $680 BSA boost would still equate to an 11% cut for Anchorage School District after years of inflation. He described a funding increase of that size as “a tourniquet” that would just stop an “absolute apocalypse” for schools in Anchorage this year.

Rep. CJ McCormick, a Bethel Democrat, was the only majority member to speak on the floor in support of increasing school funding, but said a $680 BSA boost was still “woefully inadequate.”

Tilton said debates on the one-page broadband bill started Wednesday because amendments were ready. “It was time to get the process moving” after the GOP-backed education package had stalled for three weeks, she said.

Tilton said she hoped the House would hear all the remaining amendments on Thursday with a goal to pass the education package to the Senate on Friday.

Sean Maguire

Sean Maguire is a politics and general assignment reporter for the Anchorage Daily News based in Juneau. He previously reported from Juneau for Alaska's News Source. Contact him at [email protected].

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COMMENTS

  1. 50 Fun End-of-Year Activities and Assignments

    1. Serve up a scoop of memories Here's a sweet way to celebrate the end of the year! Make paper ice cream sundaes with a different memory on each scoop. You can have kids draw these themselves or buy a printable version at the link below. Learn more: True Life I'm a Teacher 2. Post Flip farewell videos

  2. 29 Fun Last-Day-of-School Activities Your Students Will Love

    1. Stage your own classroom Olympics What better way to wrap up a great year than with your very own version of the Olympic games? Your kids will love the pomp and circumstance from the opening ceremony and challenging events to the winners on the medal podium. Learn more: Activity Village 2. Read end-of-year read-alouds

  3. 25 Fun End of the Year Classroom Activities

    Here are 25 end-of-the-year classroom activities to make the year-end memorable for both you AND your students. 1: Do passion projects. Have students choose a topic that they are passionate about. This can be ANYTHING - soccer, dogs, the environment, or fashion. Have students decide on a topic and guiding questions, and then complete research.

  4. 70+ Awesome End of the Year Activities

    Classroom Games: One way to celebrate the end of the year is by organizing exciting classroom games that will keep students engaged and entertained. These games for school can be customized to suit the interests and age groups of your students, so that everyone has a great time.

  5. End of the School Year Activities for Memorable Fun

    1. The weather is hot, and the kids want to vacation. So, why not create a vacation within the classroom? Here's an idea for a beach-themed day. 2. Themed days are so much fun for kids and throw excitement into your daily routine. Here are 12 theme ideas: camping, STEM, water, game, holiday, sports, decades, art, travel, and more.

  6. 13 Fun End of the Year Classroom Activities

    Writing Activity End of the Year Classroom Activities: Organize Class Library Organize a book library -I have a library of books that gets jumbled up every year and it is time consuming to put everything back. At the end of the year I have each student take a book from the bookshelf.

  7. 20 End of the Year Activities to Engage Your Students

    Students love "autographs.". Combine them together and you have this activity! Have students create an image on a piece of paper such as a tree. Then grab some ink pads and have each student ink up one finger. Then have them move around the room and place their "fingerprint autograph" on each person's paper.

  8. 25 Must-Do End of the Year Activities {and a FREEBIE}

    1. End of the Year Activities: STEM Day STEM Day is one of my student's favorite end of the year themed days. During the school year, we have STEM Fridays—where my students will work in table groups to complete a STEM challenge. I literally NEVER have any absent kiddos on Friday because they don't want to miss the Friday STEM challenge.

  9. 18 Engaging Last Day of School Activities

    The end of the year can only mean one thing: It's last day of school activities time! There's plenty at hand this time of year with the holidays around the corner as well as the end of the school year, but there's still a lot of time to keep your students engaged and thinking.

  10. Fun and Engaging End of the School Year Activities

    Holidays & Seasonal As the school year draws to a close, teachers are often looking for fun and engaging ways to celebrate their students' hard work and accomplishments. From classroom parties to field trips, there are plenty of options for end-of-year activities that will leave your students feeling celebrated and excited for the summer ahead.

  11. 45 Engaging End of Year Assignments for Your Classroom

    1. End of the Year Writing A favorite activity for the end of the year is this summer-themed writing activity. Students love creating their little avatar and writing in the sunglasses always adds a little extra pazazz! Learn More: 2nd Grade Savvy 2. Plastic Wrapped Desks

  12. 40 End-of-Year Gifts, Games, and Activities for Elementary Students

    1. Fill out a memory book together to reflect on the best moments of the past school year. 2. Make paper graduation caps for a festive way to celebrate moving on to the next grade. 3. Help your students create time capsules so they can record memories for their future selves. 4. Hold a field day with plenty of games for a memorable celebration.

  13. Fun End of School Year Activities: How to Make the Most of the Few Last

    Coloring brain break. Lauralee from Language Arts Classroom offers her students this end of the school year opportunity to take a break from year-end stress with this creative activity. "As students close out the year, send them off thinking positively about grammar," Lauralee suggests. "Students enjoy coloring, and coloring provides brain-breaks during a difficult time of the school year.

  14. Goodbye Stars: Last Day of School Activity for the Classroom or Online

    Classroom Resources for the End of the Year End of the Year Social-Emotional Learning Resource. The end of the year social emotional learning resource is the perfect companion to your last few weeks of school lesson plans. It includes mini-lesson ideas, printable templates, and engaging activities that reflect on the connections made in the ...

  15. 20 End-of-School-Year Classroom Activities for Teachers

    Here are 20 end-of-the-year classroom activities to consider incorporating into your last few days of school. 1. Start a Graffiti Bulletin Board If you've started to remove decorations from the walls, a graffiti board can be a way to brighten your classroom. All you need is .

  16. 5 Fun Classroom Activities For End of Year That Will Delight Your

    But it's the end of the school year, you are exhausted and coming up with ideas and plans seems impossible. That is why I am here! I'm sharing 5 fun end of year classroom activities that my 2nd grade students love. Fun Classroom Activities For End of Year . Like I said before, at the end of the school year, we are end of the school year tired.

  17. 10 EASY End of the School Year Activities

    Work together as a class to help each student create a list of 10 things they would like to do over the summer after the school year ends. Brainstorm fun and simple ideas together such as: Go to a park to play. Visit with a friend from school. Take a nap outside. Visit the local library.

  18. 41 Great Middle School End-of-Year Activities for Students

    1. Create an End-of-Year Word Search. Students review vocabulary in a fun way by creating a word search. To do the activity, students choose a favorite unit of study completed during the school year. They'll then brainstorm all the vocabulary words associated with that unit.

  19. End of the Year Activities for Upper Elementary

    End of the Year | Seasonal End of the Year Activities for Upper Elementary By Mary Montero Share This Post: It's here! It's here! The end of the year is here! Now, I always vacillate between being terribly sad the year is over and being so excited for a fresh start come August.

  20. End of Year Activities

    Let's keep going on these awesome end of year activities! End of Year 4 Corner Game. This is probably my absolutely favorite end of year activities around! I typically save this game for the second to last day or the last day if I need to. It's perfect because this game requires no prep and no paper!

  21. 5 Fun End-Of-Year Classroom Activities

    3. Class collage. This end-of-year activity is a fantastic way to create a record of the year as a class. It can be done over several lessons. This activity aims to create a large picture board of photos or drawings from the year. Tell students to collect photos or draw pictures of things they've learned throughout the year.

  22. 11 Engaging End-of-Year Activities for Middle School ELA

    Here are a few of my favorite activities to prompt end-of-year reflections: 1. Literary Yearbook. This activity puts an ELA spin on the traditional yearbook. As a class, create a literary yearbook that showcases students' favorite books, characters, and memorable quotes from the year. Encourage students to include personal reflections on how ...

  23. 8 Fun End Of The Year Activities For ESL Students

    Fun Activity 2: A Letter To Our Future Selves. In our first activity, we were looking at the past. But for our second activity, we are going to look at the future. So, for our next fun activity to end the school year, we can ask our students to write a letter to themselves for the same time the following year.

  24. EU AI Act: first regulation on artificial intelligence

    In April 2021, the European Commission proposed the first EU regulatory framework for AI. It says that AI systems that can be used in different applications are analysed and classified according to the risk they pose to users. The different risk levels will mean more or less regulation. Once approved, these will be the world's first rules on AI.

  25. Pin by Eden Case on Classroom Positives in 2024

    The ground was literally crawling...and most of the kids loved it! Those poor cicadas waited 12 long years to come up for air and they came up during recess at an Early Childhood Center. I kind of felt sorry for them. The kids were…. D. Darla Myers. Feb 4, 2024 - This Pin was discovered by Eden Case.

  26. Balliol's outreach activities are making an impact

    The Discovery Programme, our provision for Year 10 GCSE students (aged 14 - 15) in state schools, is an academic enrichment programme offering online workshops from different humanities, science and social science subjects, with the aim of motivating students to explore new areas of knowledge and develop their own academic interests and passions.Last year, workshops were provided on a ...

  27. How Social Media May Benefit Teens' Mental Health

    Find teaching jobs and other jobs in K-12 education at the EdWeek Top School Jobs virtual career fair. Register Thu., March 28, 2024, 2:00 p.m. - 6:00 p.m. ET

  28. It's Leap Year! Here are fun facts, activities, TV episodes, 'pirates

    Most celebrate their birthday on Feb. 28 or March 1 on non-leap years. There's a leap year club: The Honor Society of Leap Year Babies is a club for people born on Feb. 29. More than 11,000 ...

  29. Alaska House GOP education bill rejected as amendment debates continue

    The now-rejected Republican education package came with a $300 boost to the Base Student Allocation — the state's per-student funding formula — at a cost of $77 million per year.

  30. Cordes Teaching and Faculty Support Center Is Accepting Grant

    There are two types of grants available this year: Teaching Improvement Grants (up to $2,500 each) and Student Success Grants (funded by Global Campus, up to $5,000 each). These grants are offered to fund activities to further enhance teaching excellence in support of the teaching mission of the U of A. Grant applications are due by April 1.