February can often be a dreary month, but thankfully we have Valentine’s Day to celebrate! As teachers, we try to use every holiday and event to engage our students, capture their interest, and hopefully get them learning without even knowing it! These Valentine’s Day activities will have your students asking for more!
Valentine’s Day can be a great reason to create some fun crafts and help your students sharpen their skills in various areas. We’ve pulled together some fun Valentine’s Day activities for you and your students to try.
Valentine’s Day Crafts
Building with heart-shaped marshmallows
This first activity, building with heart shaped marshmallows, is a simple activity will encourage problem-solving and creativity in your students while they have fun building.
All you’ll need to get started are some heart-shaped marshmallows and a lot of toothpicks.
Just provide the materials and let them go to it. Younger students will tend to build flat structures. Try to encourage them to build “up” … encouraging them to problem-solve if things don’t go as planned.
Be prepared for them to sneak a few marshmallows into their mouths as they build!
“I Love These Things” Heart Activity
This hands-on heart craft is a student favorite. It can be used as a pre-writing activity and will also strengthen fine motor skills as they cut, lace, and write.
The Craft Part . . .
To begin, you’ll need to gather the following supplies:
- construction paper in colors suitable for Valentine’s hearts
- hole punch
- yarn
- old magazines
- glue
- index cards (or pieces of white paper)
- markers or crayons
First, have your students cut out two large hearts from the construction paper. Depending on your students ages and abilities, you can let them trace and cut out the hearts or you can do any part of that for them.
Next, line up the hearts and use the hole punch to punch holes all around the sides and bottom of the heart. This creates the holes students will use to lace or sew the hearts together.
Last, use the yarn to lace the two hearts together to form a pocket. Start by tying one end of the yarn to one of the holes at the side of the heart, nearest to the top. It helps to put a small piece of tape around the other end of the yarn to make it easier for little hands to thread the yarn through the holes. After they’ve gone around the heart and reached the last hole, tie it off and trim off any extra yarn.
Students can decorate their heart pocket with stickers, crayons or markers.
The Writing Part . . .
Now comes the writing part of “The Things I Love” craft. Have students look through the old magazines for pictures that represent things that they love. Then have them cut out the pictures and glue them to the index cards.
Next, have your students flip over the card and write the name of the item on the back of the card. If your students are able, have them write a sentence with the word in it.
They can keep the cards in their heart pocket. Encourage students to share their cards with each other, reading the back and discussing the things that they love.
Finally, your students will also love to take their pockets home as a gift for parents.
Valentine’s Day Games
Sight Word Bingo
Valentine’s Day wouldn’t be complete without candy hearts! This is an activity that your students will really enjoy.
Here’s what you’ll need: the free bingo card printable below and lots of candy hearts.
You can play this game in two different ways – individually or as a class.
For individual play, hand each student one of the bingo cards and a pile of candy hearts. They will use only the words on the candy hearts to fill out the card. Students will draw a heart and read the words. When they find one of the words on their bingo card, they cover the word with the candy heart. The first one to cover a row of words wins!
For full class play, give each student a blank bingo card from the printable above. Have them create their boards by dictating sight words to them that they can write anywhere on their cards. Remember to only use words that you’d find on the candy hearts.
Now, pick a heart and read the message to the class. If students have that sight word on their card, they should put the heart in that spot. Again, the first one to complete a bingo row wins!
Share your fun Valentine’s Day activities with us!
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