The end of the school year is fast approaching! Both you and your children are exhausted. You’ve both had end of year tests to contend with and now you are both counting down the remaining weeks of the year. So how do you go about keeping yourself and your pupils interested, motivated and more importantly awake for the last few weeks of the term?
One of the most successful ways to stimulate a class is to do a group project that everyone can collaborate on and be proud of at the end. The beauty of a class project is that there are so many types that you will always be able to find one to apply to the learning your pupils did that year. We’ve produced a short guide to the different types of projects that you could do with your class to help you make the last few weeks of the year a breeze!
Class quilt
Have a class discussion about the work you did that year and then allocate a square of the quilt to each student. Each square should deal with different aspects of the work you have done that year so that you produce a varied, interested and visually attractive finished piece.
Use squares of fabric and fabric pens, or give the children some embellishments to sew or glue on. You can produce the quilt as quickly as you want it to, meaning that you can make it a project that runs over a couple of weeks, rather than just a day or two.
Speech Day
Hold your own in-class speech day where the students deliver short presentations dealing with one of the topics you have covered that year. The speech could be in character, for example, if you have been studying Shakespeare’s Macbeth, what would Shakespeare say today about his play and how it is received? Or if you have been looking at Ancient Rome: what would Hadrian say about his wall if he could be transported through time to the twenty-first century? What would Isaac Newton say about modern science? The options are endless!
Creating a New Ending
This works particularly well if you have been studying a play, book, poem or even historical event during the school year. Break the class into groups and ask them to rethink the ending. Their work could be presented as a piece of writing, performed as a short play or written up as a story and then illustrated.
Murder Mystery Challenge
This project is brilliant for literature classes as you can use any book, play, poem, etc. you have been studying. The characters will easily slot into the typical murder mystery plotline, most of which are easily available online and can be doctored to suit whatever you have been studying recently. Or for the younger classes, how about playing detective and trying to solve a crime in your school? Perhaps someone has eaten one of the head teacher’s biscuits. Was it the caretaker? Or Mrs Smith from Year 6? To really bring things to life set up some clues around the school for the children to follow.
Debate
The simpler the better! Debate day has next to no requirements in terms of resources. You simply divide the class into two groups and give them the topic that the debate will be about, then tell each group what their stance is on the topic. Each student then gets a turn (ideally at a podium) to present their argument. This can be applied to most school subjects making it very versatile.
What activities does your child’s school do to mark the end of term? Are you a teacher with some brilliant end of year traditions? We’d love to hear about them on Facebook, Twitter or Instagram.