Easy Back to School Activities for the First Day of School

August 12, 2023 by Sarah White Leave a Comment

While this feels like it has been the longest summer ever (thanks to weeks of 100-degree-plus temperatures), it always kind of takes me by surprise when it’s back to school time. The good news is a lot of smart people have come up with good getting to know you and first day of school activities that you can use in the classroom if you haven’t had time to plan something.

This collaborative poster idea from Top Teaching Tasks is a fun way for kids to share a little something about themselves in words or pictures and make a visual representation of how the classroom comes together to make a whole unit.

For younger kids you can download name coloring pages from Stevie Doodles, which has free printable coloring pages of thousands of names. (You could make your own in a similar style for anyone with a more unusual name.)

Inspired Elementary has a fun 3D all about me activity where kids can draw their face and include information on their favorites, goals and other information on a flip page. (This is a paid resource but you can read about it on their website.)

The Imagination Box has a bunch of cool paid all about me templates that older kids will like, with themes like cell phones, sneakers and hoodies.

Digging Deeper Teaching Resources has a fun about me writing prompt activity that involves Skittles and writing down particular things based on the colors of the candies they receive (you can use fun packs or make your own to ensure that everyone gets at least one of each color). Example: write about a hobby for each green Skittle. I’m sharing this one even though it doesn’t look like the printable writing planner is still there because you can probably come up with ideas for kids to write about on your own.

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Games to Make with LEGO Bricks

When my daughter was younger she had a ton of LEGO bricks, and I’m honestly a little sad we got rid of most of them because there are so many fun things to do with LEGOs outside of the kits you bought them in.

I love seeing all the ideas people have for LEGO building challenges, and I have shared some ideas for LEGO games before, but I saw one on Pinterest the other day that I felt was worth a mention.

This one is for those ’80s and ’90s kids who spent sick days home from school watching “The Price is Right”: LEGO Plinko!

For those who don’t know about Plinko, the original was a giant peg board set up at an angle and the contestant would drop a flat disc at the top of the board. As it moved down the board it would hit the pegs and change the way it moved, and there would be different prizes in the slots at the bottom where the piece would land.

This version from Play Party Game works on the same principle, using LEGO bricks to make the game board and marbles in place of the Plinko disc since your game board isn’t flat.

You can really use whatever bricks you have for this build, and while it shows all the pegs the same size and evenly spaced, you can play with different configurations and see what happens. It’s engineering and a game!

And while you’re playing with your LEGOs, make sure to check out this post from Kids Craft Room that includes minute to win it style games you can do with LEGO. From speed sorting to tower building as fast as you can, these ideas are sure to get you thinking about different ways to play with LEGO.

And if you need even more ideas, check out my post with LEGO building challenges you can print out for kids (and adults!) to try.

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