Halloween is coming!

Halloween is coming! You can feel it in the air…the energy of the classroom is always HIGH! Things are getting spooky in Mrs. Lee’s classroom and the fun doesn’t stop! I want to share some of my favorite bits of Halloween in my classroom. Hopefully it will inspire you to celebrate in a big way!

My Alphabet wall is constantly changing. My kiddos know to watch for changes and they LOVE the new pictures for our themes. I put up my Halloween Alphabet the first week of October and then I just wait to see how long it takes the kids to notice. It never takes long! The kids will refer to the pictures as they color, they will find ‘their letter’ and talk about the pictures. It is a marvelous learning tool…and I don’t have to do a thing!

Halloween Alphabet!

I add more decorations as the month goes on. I made a darling set of posters and pocket chart words to increase our Halloween vocabulary. Again…the pictures do the work. The kids absolutely love them. They spark conversation and questions everyday!

One of our favorite math games during the season is called “Ghosts and Goblins”. It is a fantastic way to teach so many concepts…counting, more, less, equal or the same, and fact families. It is so simple you won’t believe it! All you need are some white beans, a green marker and a black sharpie. color one side of the bean green and add a grouchy face with the sharpie, and make a ghost face on the other white side of the bean and draw a ghost face. I make several sets of 10 and put each set of ten in a Halloween cup. The kids work with a partner and toss the beans out of the cup. We then count how many ghosts we see and how many Goblins we see. from there you can ask…which is more? Which is less? etc. The kids have so much fun, they have no idea they are doing math!

The Dramatic Play area in my classroom transforms from a fall forest and Harvest Festival into a Costume shop. I leave up the trees we painted for our forest…I’ll blog about THAT in a day or two…AMAZING…I add witches, bats, and ghosts, then our Costume shop signs and props. The kids can’t stop trying on costumes and pretending to Trick-or-Treat in the forest and around the classroom. I love it!

What would Halloween be without the art projects and the crafts? I’ll sign off with some of my past favorites, but I’m always trying new things! There are so many ways to bring Math and Literacy into the Art Center during Halloween…Not to mention Science too!