Elf on the Shelf Learning Activities

December 9, 2024 by Sarah White Leave a Comment

It seems like a lot of elementary classrooms have an Elf on the Shelf, but even if you don’t, talking and writing about elves can be a lot of fun this time of year.

Primary Theme Park has a set of free printable pages where students can write about what they would do if they were an elf (as well as drawing what they would look like). There are also pages for drawing and writing about how Santa got his elves and a dairy of an elf, which is great for older kids, too.

A Grace Filled Classroom has another take on the “if I were an elf” writing prompt that makes it a little craftier, as well as other writing prompts and ideas you can use in the classroom. Another one I love here is having a daily journal that kids pass around, with each child taking a turn writing about what the elf did that day.

Monday Mandala has a fun set of Elf on the Shelf coloring pages that you can use in the art area or have kids write a story based on what they see in the picture. I love this one of the elves playing Twister!

PJs and Paint has a whole page of printable “build your own” templates, including one for an elf. You can search for elf on the page and it will come right up for you; the printables are free so grab some more while you’re there for easy winter activities.

Simply STEAM has some writing prompt ideas you can use with older kids to get them thinking about what elves do. The bonus of these is they are no prep — just ask the kids to write for a while and see what happens. Or you can combine it with the blank elf journaling page from The Moffatt Girls, where kids can write the question at the top then answer it on the lines.

If you need more ideas for incorporating the elf into learning activities in the classroom, check out this post from Rainbow Sky Creations, which has writing, math, reading and STEM challenges that involve the elf.

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Fun Halloween Worksheets for Kids

After sharing some witch themed math activities, I found a bunch more fun printable worksheets with a Halloween theme for kids to try, so let’s take a look at some more low-prep Halloween learning fun.

Give kids practice measuring bats, spiders, ghosts and more with these printables from What I Have Learned Teaching. Kids can use a ruler, unit cubes or even little Halloween themed erasers to measure and track the size of the images.

Practice symmetry by drawing half a haunted house, ghost, skull or other simple images with this activity from Printables Hub.

I always love a good roll and draw activity, too, so check out this roll and draw a ghost activity (which has printable instructions) from Finding Myself Young.

Missy Printable Design has a cute set of Halloween worksheets for preschool, including tracing the letter H and a haunted house, spider counting, number tracing, sequencing, coloring pages and more.

The Halloween themed printables from The Artisan Life are meant to be playdough mats, and you can definitely use them for that to make the shape and trace the letters. But you could also use pipe cleaners or Wikki Stix, or line up buttons or anything else on them.

Older kids will enjoy this witch’s brew logic puzzle from Education.com. The witch has made different potions with different colors that do different things, and using the clues you can figure out which one is which. (Don’t worry; there’s an answer key included if you can’t figure it out on your own!)

Another fun puzzle is this decoder activity from Crafting Cheerfully. The holiday icons each represent a letter, and kids can use the decoder to answer the riddle. This isn’t a free resource (and the link in the post is broken but you can find it here) but it includes 20 riddles and an editable file so you can make up your own codes to decipher.

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