It’s almost Halloween! I’m here to share engaging Halloween-themed activities and centers to keep your students learning and having FUN during this crazy holiday! Use these activities and centers to take the Halloween theme all over your classroom (even the blocks center). Don’t forget to grab your FREEBIES later in this post or click HERE to grab all the Halloween Math and Literacy Unit. Let’s start planning!
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Halloween Centers & Activities!
Sensory Name Writing
Students make their name with the pumpkin letters then practice writing the letters in their name on the sensory baggie with the pom pom (one letter at a time).
Hair gel baggies are super simple to make. Grab some hair gel from the dollar store. Squeeze some hair gel in a baggie, add a few eyeballs, glitter and a few drops of gel food coloring. Tape the top closed. Trust me, you don’t want to forget this step.
Making letters
Make letters with play dough, with mini erasers, or trace the letter with a dry erase marker on these fun Halloween letter mats. Put the worksheets away and make handwriting FUN and hands on!
Halloween writing center
Put out some themed writing paper, vocabulary cards and stickers for your Halloween theme to make the writing center new and exciting for your kiddos. I also added neon paint sticks (they dry in like two minutes). Adding new writing tools keeps students writing all year long.
Color match
In my library center, you will find this cute Halloween Color Clip activity. It’s simple to play. Students clip the matching color squares. It’s bright, sparkly and great fine motor!
Want to make a set? It’s super simple! Just paint some clothespins with paint sticks (any paint will probably work) and attached foam stickers to the end. Cut up matching colored cardstock and you are all set.
Halloween clap and build
Students clap, count and build the number of syllables each word has using these connecting cubes.
Halloween bookshelf
I absolutely have a children’s book obsession so I change out the bookshelf for every theme! The bottom of the bookshelf is for our class books we’ve made and our book hospital. Want a list of my favorite Halloween books? Click HERE!
Witches’ Brew Counting Game
Your students will FLIP over this counting game. They pick a recipe card and count out the objects to create the witches’ brew! I bought all of the “ingredients”, tray, and cauldron at the dollar store. Click HERE to grab your FREEBIE!
Monster Race
Races make any game more exciting so I just had to make a Monster Race game for our Halloween theme. Instead of using counters, I put out googly eyes for students to use to cover their boards. Students roll one or two dice and cover the corresponding number of spaces on their board. The first one to race to the end wins!
Witch number trace it
Trace numbers with candy corn. If you are worried about students eating the candy, make each child their own baggie. Don’t want to use candy? Use mini erasers or any small manipulatives you have in your classroom.
Shape jack-o-lanterns
Jack-o-lanterns are a must for every Halloween theme and what better way to teach shapes than to make shape faces. Students will laugh and giggle as they make jack-o-lantern faces with the shapes (and learn a ton too).
Halloween STEM
Don’t forget to add Halloween props to the blocks center. Add spiders, popsicle sticks (for making fences), ghosts, bats, bones (Q tips), jack o lanterns and foam boards (green/brown for dirt/fields). Add real photographs to inspire students to plan, design and build new things. I put up these Halloween STEM I can Build Cards on the bulletin boards to inspire my little engineers.
I made the ghosts by putting a tissue over a cotton ball and wrapping a pipe cleaner around it! Super simple and so cute!
Mummy craft
How cute is this little mummy? It’s a fun craft you can do for small group or even at the Halloween party. I cut out the mummy for my students but you can have your students cut the mummy out themselves if they are able to. All students do is tear up paper towels and glue them to the mummy. Once the mummy is covered, glue on two eyes and it’s finished! Grab the mummy pattern HERE.
Halloween play dough tray
Play dough trays are the BEST thing ever, as my students would tell you. I make one for every theme now because they LOVE them so much and there are so many benefits (build fine motor strength, increase their vocabulary, use their imaginations, problem solve). Grab some cookie cutters, googly eyes, cut up black pipe cleaners (in the middle of the tray), spider rings and play dough. Let your students create Halloween sculptures with the play dough.
Halloween transfer activity
I don’t know what it is about sparkly pom poms but my students love transferring them into fun ice cube trays like these that I found at the dollar store. The pom poms are different sizes so students are learning about math and building fine motor as they use the tweezers. Sometimes the simplest activities are the biggest hit!
Halloween sensory table
In the sensory table are black beans, pumpkin gems, small scoops, tweezers and small jack-o-lanterns. Lots of fine motor work going on in the sensory table as they fill dump, pinch and scoop!
Pumpkin Patch dramatic play
We changed the dramatic play center into a pumpkin patch. Read all about how we did it and what students were learning through play HERE.
Grab all the printable Halloween Math and Literacy Centers for your classroom HERE! Save time and go home after school because I’ve created it all for you. Just print and prep!
If you need some amazing Halloween themed books, check out THIS book list!
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