End of Year Student Gift and Party

Today was our last day of school!

To begin our day, I wanted our morning work to be a bit more fun, but something that would hold my children's interest for a while.  I got this idea from a follow teacher and quickly saw how much fun they would have, so I went with it.  I covered their group of desks with bulletin board paper, and I put out washable markers, which they almost never get to use.  When they came in I told them they would get to draw all over their area with markers, and they could draw anything they wanted.  They absolutely loved it!  Here's a picture of one of the group's handiwork.

I thought this drawing was so cute!

As the day went one, we played math games, cleaned our desks and looked through all of our folders before packing them for home.  I read stories to them and we worked on our Memory Books.  They loved playing our End of Year Scavenger Hunt.  They looked for friends who loved or were doing certain things mentioned on the scavenger hunt.  You can get your FREE copy by clicking on the name, End Of Year Scavenger Hunt.

All day long, they asked the same question over and over... "Is it time for the party to start?" Finally, it was time!

For the End-of-Year party, we made Ice Cream Sundaes, complete with all the toppings!  While we enjoyed our sweet concoctions, we watched our End-of-Year photo video, featuring all of my sweet kiddos.  After the video, I handed each kid or parent a card with the QR code and link to the End-of-Year photo video, where they can download the video to their own computer.

In addition to the End-of-Year photo video I spoke about in my last post, I like to give my students a little going away present.  I found these colorful beach pails at Dollar General for a buck each.  I used paint pens to personalize a pail for each of my students.

To go inside each pail, I made a treat bag with a few pieces of candy. 

Then I put the treat bag inside beach pail, along with a couple of pieces of sidewalk chalk.  I found a large container of 54 pieces of sidewalk chalk at Hobby Lobby for $6, and using the weekly 40% off coupon, the whole thing was less than $4.  That was about 7 cents for each piece of chalk - a real bargain.

Finally, I gave my sweet kiddos their personalized beach pails to take home and enjoy over the summer, and received in return, some of the sweetest hugs and smiles.  It was a great party to end a great year!