20 End of The Year Lesson Ideas

20 End of the Year Lesson Ideas
1. Write a letter to next years students. They can tell them what to expect and offer advice on how to succeed. They can share what they like most about your class and what they like least. They can share their favorite book and how they feel about writing. This works as a great reflection for you as well. 2. Have students (who are not seniors) write a letter to themselves for their graduation day. If you are so inclined, keep these and then track them down years later to give them out. Not too difficult if they stay in your school. Students can write about how they feel about school and how they expect things will be in the next ___ years. 3. Students publish their best piece of writing and create an online magazine such as ISSUU. 4. Hold an Oscar-type award presentation in your classroom. Say something nice about each student and give awards for things like. Brightest Smile Most Improved in Reading Most Improved in Spelling Hardest Worker Outstanding Behavior Most Responsible Best Attitude Always Dependable Always Polite Computer Whiz Class Bookworm Most cooperative in Your Group Most Creative Writer Excellence in Reading Great Participation (ask students to create the categories) 5. Florida Teachers, Submit up to five student entries to the FCTE writing Awards. DUE May 31st. 6. Establish a Blog if you havent already to continue the conversations into the summer. This becomes a great place to hold online booktalks and to prepare student for the upcoming year. Consider EDMODO. Its also a great way to get started on a blog for next year by trying out the features and connecting with students through this platform. 7. If you have 3 weeks or more left, consider using the Literature Circles packet and provide some popular YA titles of even books from the summer reading list. As each group reads, they can report on it to other groups and soon everyone wants to read that cook. 8. Join the Summer Reading Challenge through Scholastic. Find other reading challenges and groups through your local library and reading councils. 9. Year-end Jeopardy Work in groups to create questions/answers with your given categories. Classes can create for other classes or groups for other groups. Use this Jeopardy template. 10. Positive Words Give students a list of all the students in the class and ask them to write something NICE about each person in the class. Create a single page for each student. You can either type these up (I used to do this so the handwriting was not recognizable) or you can cut the worksheets into strips for each student. It makes a LASTING impression. *Be sure to read all of these carefully. 11. Summer Reading Book Talks / Reading Lists To motivate students to read during the summer, invite them to share their favorite books with classmates. Type up a list of the titles with authors and make copies. During their book talks, students share an exciting part of the book without giving away the ending. Classmates highlight titles that sound interesting.
12. Book Commercial Students choose one book they have read and want to recommend for next years incoming class . Create a 2 minute videotaped commercial. 13. Play learning games: If your classroom is stocked with a variety of educational games, now is a good time to pull them out for entertainment. Organize game centers around the classroom and allow students to pick which ones they would like. Set a timer and have groups rotate from one activity to another periodically. 14. Vocabulary / Spelling Bee: Pull out all vocabulary words and hold a class spelling /vocabulary bee. Even the older students like to play this game. Divide the class into teams to encourage more teamwork and participation. 15. Create Scavenger Hunts. If you can get the students to create some materials /lessons for you for next year, all the better. The best way to learn it so teach others. Let students work in pairs to create scavenger hunts (or other lessons) based on different topics of your choice. IF time permits, classes can do the other classes lessons and vote on the best (for a prize?). 16. Say thank you: Students show their appreciation by writing thank you cards for their favorite school staff. This can be parent volunteers, the principal, the custodial or food service workers. 17. Let students create your bulletin boards. For me, bulletin boards were just NOT my thing. I am not artistic and creative in that department. This would be a great thing for your students to do, though. You can give groups different themes and they could gather, create, all the items for your bulletin boards so you can change them easily throughout the year. 18. The Year in Review Students create a one page flier (must be condensed to a page) about the most important world/us events that they remember from the year. They can bring in articles and pictures from the internet. Each group can do a different topic and they have to agree which are the most important to be put on the page. These can be placed in a large scrapbook and will make great memory pieces for each new class to both look at and add to. You can assign topics such as: a. Music b. Politics c. Pop Culture d. News e. World Affairs f. Our Class/School g. Our community h. Our personal lives 19. Have a theme lunch/breakfast. Students write a piece related to the theme and also bring in a food that represents that theme. As you enjoy the food, each student reads their piece. (divide into 2days. You can also publish if time and money permits) Examples: a. Heritagewrite a piece about your culture and bring in an item that relates to their heritage. b. Shakespeare- Write a review of a movie/play, an original sonnet, a paraody of Shakespeare and bring in food of an Elizabethan age c. Novels Write a review of a favorite novel (or stories/poetry) or those you covered in the year. Bring in food that was mentioned or relates to the novel. d. Ask students to generate their own THEMES for your approval 20. Daily Discussions: Bring in articles relevant to the students lives and simply talk about them. Start testing ideas for incorporating (more) relevant discussions in the classroom and how to manage the critical thinking and discussion parameters.
The End of the School Year Time for Teachers
Meet with Colleagues At this point of the year most teachers have had their full share of meetings, but meeting with teachers assistants, grade level or department teams is well worth the time and effort. Discuss what worked during the year, what didn't, and allow for a bit of venting over frustrations. But most importantly use the time to exchange ideas and problem solve for the upcoming school year. Organize Computer Files Use a service like DROPBOX if you dont already have oneto share files from school and your home computer. Make an OPEN FIRST box. This box should hold the most important things you need to get started: any lesson plan binders, teacher editions text books, phone lists and general office supplies. Make Time to write If nothing else, write a few journal entries about what you accomplished and didnt this school year and write a note to yourself about what you need to work on most for next year. Put this in the OPEN FIRST box. Prepare for the Fall Do some advance prep work for the Fall. Use this time to go through files and clean up what you use and dont use. Dont keep everything just in case. Get rid of it. Laminate and make copies of items that you use frequently so you can start off the year with a good supply. Go through files and pull out anything that cannot be of use the following year.

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The End of the School Year Time for Teachers

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