My 5 Favorite Halloween Activities for First Grade
It’s spooky season, and you all know that I love themed lessons! My 5 favorite Halloween activities for first grade include word work, writing centers, letters, math practice, and much more! You can use these activities as-is or adapt them for your classroom of learners and their particular needs. One thing is sure: these activities will put a ✨ spell ✨ on your students! They’ll be having so much fun that they won’t even realize they’re also learning. Read on for some FA-BOO-LOUS ideas! ⤵️
#1: Witch's Brew Word Work Activity
Students love creating the witch’s brew! First, have them write their words with a white crayon. Next, they can use watercolor paints or markers to color over top of their writing. In the end, their words will magically appear! This activity is engaging because kids love the excitement of revealing words as they color or paint.
🪄 Magical ideas for using The Witch’s Brew:
- Sight Words
- Spelling Words
- Letters
- Name Practice
The final product also makes for a great bulletin board display. You can find my Witch’s Brew printable here, and get started mixing up a batch in your classroom today!
#2: Halloween FREEZE Game & Writing Center
Students love playing the Halloween FREEZE game because it combines movement, music, and the element of suspense! First, give each student one of the 30 vocabulary picture cards. Next, turn on some fun Halloween music. Kids can dance or move around the room, but when you pause the music, everyone must FREEZE! You will read one “Who has the _______ card?” The student who has the chosen card wins the round. Finally, you start the music and play again! (And again, and again, and again!)
Your students will benefit from this activity in so many ways. It’s a cooperative game where you all bond as a class to learn and play. Students can learn and practice new vocabulary in a fun and engaging way. In addition, no one is ever “out,” and the game can be as long or as short as you need. Finally, it’s a purposeful movement break that gets students out of their seats and into the activity!
If you’re looking for more movement activities, you can find them in my blog post, “Why I Quit Doing Brain Breaks.”
Halloween FREEZE Writing Center
After the game (and once everyone has gotten their wiggles and giggles out!), you can reuse your vocabulary picture cards for a writing activity or center. This 22+ page bundle contains 30 colorful Halloween activity cards, plus writing prompts and responses that you can use to help students practice throughout the month.
Some other 🪄magical ideas for using the cards include:
- Classroom I-Spy
- Write the Room
- Sort the cards by the number of syllables
#3: Teach Frankenstein to Write
This interactive activity makes editing practice and writing complete sentences engaging and fun! Students love the idea of “teaching Frankenstein to write.” This step-by-step projectable lesson with slides is perfect for busy teachers who don’t have much time to focus on teaching grammar. In addition, unlike many grammar lessons, it’s enjoyable!
To accompany the lesson, students can complete a directed drawing that’s secretly an entertaining editing activity! They can edit each direction to make it a complete sentence. Finally, they can follow the instructions in the sentences to draw their own Frankenstein!
#4: Hide and Seek
One of my favorite Halloween activities is playing Hide and Seek! This editable whiteboard game allows you to choose between sight words or letters. You can even customize it to your own word list!
Here’s how it works:
- Drag the witch behind one of the cauldrons.
- Click “Slideshow” and project it to the class.
- Students have to guess where the witch is hiding! They take turns clicking on the green bubbles to make them disappear.
- When the witch appears, choose a new game slide or move the witch to a new spot and play again!
🪄 Magical classroom ideas for using Hide and Seek:
- Sight word practice
- Spelling words
- Letters
- Name practice
- Use as a center
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#5: Halloween Math Activities
Over 10,000 teachers have used these FREE hands-on math centers! You can grab this bundle and enjoy three interactive math centers or small group activities that are fun and engaging. They are also perfect for reward lunches or parties! These are definitely among my favorite Halloween activities for the fall season.
- Terrifying Toss:
- Set up a tossing game with buckets or rings. You can also use hula hoops, tubs, or any large container. Add point values to each target.
- Students take turns tossing Halloween squishy toys, fake spiders, balls, or any other Halloween goodie toward each target.
- Record scores and allow the winner to pick a small Halloween prize!
- Trick or Treat Addition:
- Put the printable cards into a bag or bucket.
- Students can take turns pulling one card and solving the problem.
- If a student draws a special “TRICK” or “TREAT” card, they must follow the directions on the card!
- EYE Love Math:
- Write numbers on plastic “eyeballs” (ping pong balls)
- Put them in a basket or bucket. I add water beads for a slimy feel!
- Students take turns pulling out two “eyes.” They then use the numbers to create and solve their number sentence!
Pick up your ✨ FREE ✨ math activities and enjoy working with your students through each interactive and entertaining game!
If you’re having a hard time choosing “witch” activity your class will love the most, you can find them all bundled together as a part of my Halloween Favorites Bundle! This bundle includes each activity listed above, PLUS a 6th activity that your students will surely enjoy. You will be the Hallow-Queen when incorporating these themed activities into your lessons this month!
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