Fun Beginning of the School Year Activities — Team Mascots

My daughter goes back to school in a week and I know that whether school is in person, online or a mix for your kiddos it’s likely to look and feel different this year. But there are still a lot of fun beginning of the school year activities kids can do to get to know each other and build classroom spirit, no matter what the classroom looks like.

Teach Student Savvy has a great collection of beginning of the year activities, but one that caught my eye was the group name and mascot activity, which she has as a freebie on Teachers Pay Teachers.

This activity works for a range of ages and has groups of kids (could be the table or small learning group if your class is using the pod/cohort model) come up with a “team” name and mascot based on things the group members have in common or like. In a small classroom the whole group can work on the project together.

You could do this activity with a virtual class as well by dividing up into smaller groups.

Check out her post for a lot more great ideas for celebrating the start of the weirdest school year ever.

[Photo: Teach Student Savvy.]

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Whether you have snow where you live or are on the wrong side of the world for that, these snow glob crafts for kids are a lot of fun to put together at home or in the classroom.

If you want to keep it super basic, you can download some snow globe coloring pages from Monday Mandala and have kids drawn in their own images (or color in what is there for the ones that are already filled). This could be a fun way to play with different media, having kids paint in one, draw in another, or use crayons in one, colored pencils in another, etc.

Or you can add your kid (or a classroom full of kids) to snowglobes with this craft from Twitchetts. It’s easy to make and fun for kids to help with, too.

You can also make snow globes with paper plates pretty easily, and there are lots of different options out there that should give you some ideas. This one from In the Playroom uses blue glittery pompoms as the snow and has a snowman in the background (though you can use whatever you want).

Mas and Pas uses a clear plate on top of a regular plate to make its snow globe, and Daydream into Reality just uses a paper plate to make the snow globe shape but there’s no snow involved. Their template includes different images you can put in the snow globe, or draw your own.

If you want to make a snow globe without the watery (so potentially less mess) you can make a waterless snow globe out of a plastic cup with this tutorial from The Pragmatic Parent. It uses tiny foam balls as the snow. Tidy Mom’s version uses a real glass jar and fake snow to flurry around.

And if you’re OK with using liquids in your snow globe, which will allow the snow to flutter like in a real snow globe, check out this version from 123 Homeschool 4 Me, which uses water and baby oil.

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