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Celebrating the end of the year can be a special time for you and your students, use the end of the year countdown to celebrate their successes!

Make the end of the year count for your students and yourself. I'm sharing my favorite end of the year hacks with you! Use the time you have spent the last few weeks to prep and make back-to-school easier and less stressful! Help your students transition by reflecting on the school year and celebrating everything they have done, accomplished, and learned! Now, let's get started.

Encourage kids to answer the questions in this free printable journal to celebrate the end of a school year and to capture its memories forever! Whether you are a teacher, a parent or a homeschooler,

FUN End of the Year Art Projects- It's the end of the year-go out having FUN! I know how it goes at the end of the year-your tired, the kids are tired...EVERYONE is ready for summer break! Go out with a bang with these super fun end of the year art projects!

Fun and engaging End of the Year activities and freebies perfect for your students! Use some or all of them to help finish out the year strong!

Here are 10 end of the year celebration ideas to use in your classroom with direct links to educational resources.

One of my favorite projects of the year is our End of the Year Memory Book. It's a special keepsake for students and parents that features photos, drawings, writing samples, and more. It's a project the class works on periodically throughout the year. I love it because it shows how much the kiddos change over the year. It gives parents a memento to remember the year by, rather than trying to save everything the child brings home. #guiltyofthat This is Ellee. She was in my very first class. She just started 10th grade! Her Mom sent me these pictures of her looking back on her Kindergarten Memory Book before school started last month. It made me so happy to know that she was reliving all of the fun we had in Kinder. Crazy to think 10 years has come and gone! You can see in the photos that Word Art was all the rage back in 2007. LOL. I've made some updates to my Kinder Memory Book since 2007, and I've also created a Preschool and 1st grade version. I have some tips for creating these Memory Books that will make them manageable. 1. If you have active parent volunteers, find a parent that will head up this project. My first year in the classroom, I had 26 kids in my morning class and 25 in the afternoon. 51 memory books! Thank goodness I had an amazing aide and some super parents that helped out. 2. Two options for binding the memory books... You can copy all of the pages you need and bind them over the summer/at the beginning of the year. However, I think it's better to wait to bind them until the END of the year. To keep it all organized, I have a file folder for each student. As we complete a memory book page, I file the completed page away in the child's folder. Then at the end of the year, all the pages are in order and ready to be bound. 3. Print extra copies for potential new students or for "Uh Oh" mistakes. 4. If you forget to take a photograph of a student for a certain page, they can draw a picture instead. The combination of photographs and illustrations will make it extra special. 5. You can send a page home for "homework" every now and then if you just don't have time to get to it in class. Be sure to tell your students how important these pages are so they come back in good condition. I would recommend sending them home in an envelope or file folder so they don't get ripped, folded, or destroyed on the way home. :) 6. I've included extra pages at the end for photographs. Students can personalize it, color it, add stickers, get autographs from friends, etc. The teacher can write a special note to the child in the back of the book as well. These Memory Books will work great for Homeschool Kiddos and for the crafty Mamas out there. Just print and use the pages you need. I'm thrilled to be making one with my preschooler.

Celebrate the end-of-the-year with a self-portrait class t-shirt! It is the perfect sentimental keepsake, as you end a "TEE-riffic Year!" FREE gift tag and video tutorial included!

After spending the entire school year building and fostering a strong classroom community, I love to end the school year by celebrating all the friendships that were made during the year. The end of the school year season can be hard on students. Some students are not looking forward to the summer or leaving the community that you have built. By weaving friendship tasks into your end-of-the-year routine, you give students a little something fun to look forward to each day and remind them that they are still a part of the community! You will want to add these five friendship activities to your end-of-the-year toolbox to keep students engaged, feeling like an important part of your classroom community, and excited about the future with the friendships that they made in the class. 1. The countdown is on! I love countdowns because you can use any amount of days that you want as you countdown to the last day of school, AND you can focus on any topic you think is important for your students...like friendships! For our friendship countdown, we use 20 days. Each day is filled with a friendship-focused task to celebrate the good friends that we made this year! I love that the activities for each day include simple things that require no prep, like "Eat lunch with someone you never ate lunch with this year!" The kids LOVE that they get to spend a little extra time with someone from class each day! You can encourage your students to work together with a friend from class while they complete this FREE engaging activity. For an extra twist, team up with another class and have students make a new friend while they complete this activity together. Your students will also love working on this FREE writing and math project together! 2. Try Some Friendship Task Cards Students need help to remember the good times of the school year! So many times when we brainstorm our favorite memories, the kids always say, "I forgot about that!" These friendship task cards have a focus for students to reflect upon. I love the discussions and writing that come from this activity! Just print, go, and hang these task cards around the room! 3. Spread Positivity Writing thank-you notes in my classroom is a staple! We love to write thank you notes to special staff members, parent volunteers, after special programs, and just about any time we are feeling grateful! Feeling grateful for friends and writing them thank-you notes at the end of the year is always a hit with my students! Make sure each student gets a thank you note by having a student of the day that all students write to or by having students randomly select names from a basket. A quick note and picture on the inside mean a lot to students, especially at the end of the year when they are feeling down and not quite ready to leave the classroom community! 4. Read a Friendship Book Got a few spare minutes at the end of the year in between all the festivities planned? Read a Friendship Book! Try one of these favorites that are sure to get your students chatting about fond friendship memories of the school year! These are also the perfect read-aloud to share with students when those end-of-the-year friendship issues start to show up! Snail Crossing written by Corey Tabor Out of Nowhere written by Chris Naylor-Ballesteros Memory Jar written by Vera Brosgol Me and You in a Book For Two written by Jean Reidy Bravo, Avocado written by Chana Stiefel A Mouthful of Minnows written by John Hare Friends written by Daniela Sosa As a no-prep followup, have students take a plain piece of paper, fold it into fourths, and use all four spaces to create illustrations or paragraphs (or both) of favorite friendship memories of the year! 5. Write a Community Building Letter If you have followed me for a while, you know that building community is an important part of my entire school year! Community building should not just be done in the first two weeks of school. One activity I love to do with students to build community all year long is to write letters to different students each month. The kids love writing them and receiving them! It is something that kids look forward to each month. At the end of the year, we write longer letters and create scrapbook pages about each student. It is a great keepsake of the year and the friendships that were made! Again, make sure each student gets a thank you note by having a student of the day that all students write to or by having students randomly select names from a basket. A quick note and picture on the inside mean a lot to students, especially at the end of the year when they are feeling down and not quite ready to leave the classroom community! These 5 friendship celebration ideas for the end of the year are easy to implement and require little to no prep! They are also loved by students and will surely end your year on a positive note. You would also love to read: 7 Ways to Celebrate the End of the School Year 10 Easy and Fun End of the Year Celebration Ideas End of the Year Tips for Writing Thank You Cards Countdown to the Last Week of School with These Books End of the Year Project Tips Kicking off Summer Reading in the Classroom Field Day Management Hacks Every Teacher Needs Looking for more end-of-the-school-year activities that kids love? See more HERE. LOVE these ideas? Pin to save! *affiliate links: “Think Grow Giggle is a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to Amazon.” (source: Section 5)

It's that time again - the end of the school year! I've come up with a list of 37 end of the year activities that you can use in your own classroom to make those last days of school special and fun for you and your students. Click through to read all of the ideas - lots of links are included to more resources!

Our Kindergarten teachers approached me with a request for an art project for the back cover of their memory books. The kids have filled out pages in their memory books all year and they wanted a colorful back cover. I found a fun and easy way to make fingerprint art on the Frogs Snails and Puppy Dog Tails blog. Then, we used a great end of year poem by Helen H. Moore. We started by dripping water in pans of … Read more... →

End of year reflection for teachers is key for making changes and celebrating the positives. This post shares ideas for reflecting on the end of the year.

Browse through a fantastic list of end of the homeschool year traditions and find some new ideas!

85+ End of the Year Awards for your students! Host an award ceremony in your classroom! Your students will LOVE it!

Preschool graduation ideas and activities for a ceremony or a simple end of the school year celebration. Gifts, crafts, poems, snacks.

Make the end of the school year memorable and special with our Teacher Superlative Awards! Designed to celebrate the dedication, creativity, and hard work of educators, these awards add a touch of fun and lightheartedness to your end-of-year celebrations. Our collection of Teacher Superlative Awards includes a variety of playful categories that highlight the unique qualities and contributions of staff and teachers. From "Nostalgia Teacher" for oldest teacher who has been in the building for a while to "Best Mentor" for the one who can support and guide colleagues, there's an award for every member of your school community. These awards are not only a fantastic way to show appreciation and recognition but also serve as a wonderful morale booster for your school team. Whether you're presenting them at a staff luncheon, end-of-year assembly, or virtual celebration, our Teacher Superlative Awards are sure to bring smiles, laughter, and heartfelt appreciation. Features: Fun and lighthearted awards for celebrating teachers and staff. Playful categories that highlight unique qualities and contributions. Designed to boost morale and foster a sense of appreciation. Perfect for end-of-year celebrations, staff luncheons, or virtual events. Printable and customizable templates available for easy use. Give your teachers the recognition they deserve with our Teacher Superlative Awards. Let's celebrate their excellence and make the end of the year truly memorable! Check out my student superlatives too!