A {Semi-Educational} Fourth Grade Halloween Party

When John’s teacher asked me to pull together centers for a Halloween Party, I was all “yayyyyyyyy”!!!!!!  Parties are my jam.  When she asked that they be somewhat educational (I did ask the question, in all fairness), I was all “booooooo”.  Not because I don’t see the value in that, but rather because I’m pretty sure these kids are smarter than me and I was doubting my ability to come up with something educational AND fun.  Always up for a challenge, I tied on my fourth grade thinking cap, came up with a handful of ideas, ran them by our resident nine year old, and set to work!  We had the party today and it was a great success.  I pulled a few games and printables from other blogs and created the rest myself.  The party was 1 hour long, with 5 stations each taking 10 minutes.  The remaining time was alotted for dividing up into groups and rotating between stations.  With the help of wonderful parents that volunteered all of the needed items and their time to man the stations, here’s how it all went down…

Table Tents / Instructions

First things first, I made a table tent for each station, with instructions for that activity on the back.  This makes it very easy for parent volunteers to know what they are doing.

Halloween Rotation 4th grade – Courtesy of Dixie Delights

Full Moon Pudding

Need: Pudding cups, oreos, crushed oreos, gummy worms, spoons, napkins, mini water bottles

Directions:
Open pudding tops
Spoon in layer of crushed Oreo cookies
Top with gummy worms
Take top off of Oreo cookie and slide side with filling into cup to look like full moon
Enjoy!

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Candy Corn Calculations

This station was at the same table as Full Moon Pudding to eat up the rest of the time.

Need: Container filled with candy corn, rulers, paper, pencils

Formulas:
Rectangle V= lXwXh
Cylinder V=Pi r2 h

Directions:
Use math or guess work to estimate how many pieces of candy are in the container
Find volume of container
Find volume of single piece of candy (use rectangle formula)
Divide to see how many will fit
Closest to actual number in each group gets spider ring
Overall class winner takes home the jar!

*I say math or guess work because we don’t want to stress anyone out. It’s all in fun!  We ended up with a tie for closest guess (300 – there were 312 in the jar) and had to bring those two back to hone their calculations.  (John was one!)  The winner ended up with 314 and John had 317.  It was GREAT!

Download FREE Worksheet with Formulas HERE – Courtesy of Dixie Delights

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Boo Bingo (Multiplication)

Need: laminated bingo cards, laminated equation cards, candy corn markers, dry erase marker, wipes

Directions:
Give each student a bingo card and 15 pieces of candy
Call out equations; mark as called with dry erase marker
Student calls BOO Bingo
Check answers and give winner a spider ring

Download FREE Bingo Game HERE – Courtesy of Gael’s Crafty Treasures

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Scary Scattergories

Need: Timer, A-Z pages, pencils

Directions:
Set the Timer for 4 minutes. Work as individuals OR in pairs.
Play 2 rounds with categories of: Halloween and Fall (we also had time for a lightening round of 1 minute where we did the category Costumes)
Before the timer ends they have to write down as many unique words as they can think of A-Z
When the time is up, each player shares what word they chose for each letter. If no other player used their themed word, they get a point! No points for blank lines. Add up the points and see who wins.
Winners get a spider ring

Download FREE Scattergories Sheet HERE – Courtesy of Crafting Chicks

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Trick or Treat Taboo

Need: Timer, candy, clue cards

Divide cards into 2 stacks face down; Divide into 2 teams; each team gets 5 pieces of candy
Each team picks a clue giver; This student sits on the side of the table with the OTHER team and holds their team’s clue cards
Cards have the clue word in orange and the taboo words listed below. Clue-giver starts 1 min timer and must get their team to say the word in orange without using any of the taboo words.
If a taboo word is used, Team B takes a piece of Team A’s candy and the current card goes into the discard pile.
If the team guesses correctly, they get to take a piece of the other team’s candy and should quickly move to the next card.
If the clue giver decides to pass on a card, it goes to the discard pile and they lose a piece of candy.
Once time runs out, play repeats with Team B.
When play goes back to Team A, pick a new clue giver.
Each team divides up their candy at the end of the game.

Rules:
1. Clue-givers may not use any taboo words, including abbreviations and any part of the taboo word.
2. Clue-givers may not use sound effects or use gestures to indicate the clue word.
3. When time is called, the final card does not go into the discard pile, but is instead removed from play.

Download FREE Halloween Taboo Game HERE – Courtesy of Dixie Delights

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Spooky Science

Show how skeleton works and dry ice demonstration

Download Lesson Plan HERE – Courtesy of very bright mom in the class :-)

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And that was all she wrote!  It was a wonderfully fun hour that far exceeded my expectations.  The kids stayed completely engaged in every center.  I look forward to recycling this party in its entirety in three years :-)
xoxo

Tour Our Halloween House Room by Room
Overview | Exterior & Foyer | Den & Office | Kitchen + Dining Room | Porch

Halloween Videos
Home Tour  |  Halloween Bunting DIY Video   |  Halloween Haul Video

Halloween House 2015

All Holiday & Seasonal Decor

DIXIE DELIGHTS DELIVERED

4 thoughts on “A {Semi-Educational} Fourth Grade Halloween Party

  1. What a blessing to have parents like you in the classroom. THIS is the stuff I loved about teaching- but when you combine creating fun, educational content like this (which I KNOW took a good amount of time and resources) with grading papers, parent conferences, teacher inservice, individual assessments, testing, lesson planning, justifying all your lessons with multiple Common Core standards and objectives, rotating decorations and content in the classroom to keep it novel, providing emotional support to students, making sure everyone has their lunch for the day and/or ate breakfast, dealing with family dramas, bullying, staff meetings, and MORE, it makes me remember why I took a hiatus from teaching.
    Long story short, keep up the nobel, good work and thank you from the bottom of every teacher’s heart. You’re awesome :)

  2. Next elementary school party you do I want an invitation! Both the first grade and fourth grade parties look like so much fun!!! I know your sons and their teachers love what you do to help them have fun learning.

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