The end of the year is a chaotic time for kids, but especially for teachers! During this time, it’s so helpful to have a toolbox of fun and meaningful activities for kids to complete. Many of these ideas you really can do on your own. Of course, if you’re needing ideas and resources fast, I’ve created this set of activities for the last weeks of school you can get right away.
Here are nine fun end of the year activities that you and your kids will love!
1. Give Time for Student Reflection. Reflection is an important part of the end of the school year! Not only does it help students think about what they’ve learned, but it helps you know what went well and what might need to be tweaked for next year. You can have students interview each other about their most memorable experience, biggest accomplishment, favorite topic, and more. Use this free start the process with this free end of the year interview activity.
2. Write a Letter to Next Year’s Teacher. Writing to next year’s teacher is an activity I always did with my students in summer school if they didn’t do at the end of the year. It’s the perfect way to get kids thinking about expectations for next year, while giving them the ability to share concerns and questions. Have students share information about themselves, their learning styles, strengths, struggles, and goals for the future. Even if you don’t know yet who their next year’s teacher will be, you can save the letter and pass it along when you find out. Best of all, it helps the next years’ teacher get a glimpse of their upcoming learners!
3. Create a Class Memory Book. This activity is so simple but so fun! Have each student create a page about their favorite activity or class event. It could be anything from learning a specific topic to a field trip the class went on. Then, put all of these student pages together as a class memory book. Make copies for each student and send them home. Both kids and parents will love looking through at all the amazing things the class did over the year. Keep one for your own class library, too, of course!
4. Have Students Design a Bulletin Board. This is one of my favorite activities because it really serves two purposes: kids reflect about the year but also design your beginning of the year bulletin board all in one. Win! Have students work in partners or small groups to write about their favorite activities, what they learned in each subject, and anything else.
5. Reflect on Goals. Give time for students to look at their progress in the past year. Show kids their progress with reading or math scores, their behavior plan, or anything else they were working on. Every student is different, so individual goals might vary greatly. This is such an important activity to help kids build confidence, but also to make goals for the future. Best of all, you can save this goal reflection and pass it along to next year’s teacher.
6. Have Students Write a Letter to Themselves. I love to call this activity “Dear Future Self” because kids are writing to themselves in the future! Have students write to their future selves about their favorite hobbies, activities, strengths, and goals for the future. Something that makes this activity extra special is holding onto these letters in a file until that class graduates years in the future.
7. Have Students Give Advice to Next Year’s Students. Have students write letters or make posters to give specific advice to next year’s students. Again, this is a great activity because it helps you now and for the next year! Post the advice up on a bulletin board or just around your room at the beginning of next year.
8. Celebrate with Student Awards. Spend time recognizing individual student talent, success, and growth with student awards. Make the awards personalized, unique, and fun to make it extra special! Some of my favorite awards are: Leadership Award, Most Likely to Help Achieve World Peace, Aspiring Author, and Future Athlete. Most of all, it’s wonderful to recognize every single student for what they are best at.
9. Create a Time Capsule. Have students bring in a shoe box and add in items that represent this school year! They can add notes, work they’ve completed, pictures, drawings, and anything else. Kids love this because it’s a hands-on and interactive way to remember their year.
If you need all of these activities for the end of the year and more, I’ve got you covered! I love this End of the Year Bundle filled with writing activities, crafts, hands-on activities, task cards, worksheets, class awards, and more. Sometimes just a few extra tricks up your sleeve can help the end of the year run smoothly.
Have a great end of the year!
In my school, we are encouraged not to target any one specific holiday during this time of year so that no students are left out. Sometimes, this is challenging because many great lessons and activities are focused around Christmas. For the many teachers that have to teach in the next couple of days right before holiday break, I thought some ideas for the classroom would be useful.
