New Year’s Activities

Are you looking for low-prep New Year’s activities? The end of winter break means the holidays have come and gone. New Year’s Day is a holiday that I love to teach about but often gets overlooked. My students often return from winter break excited to tell me how they spent the New Year, and they are never afraid to share that they were allowed to stay up until the ball dropped. 🙂 

On that first day back from break, I’m usually so focused on practicing our routines and jumping back into curriculum that my New Year’s activities fall to the wayside. I began creating some activities that I could add to our schedule for our first day after break that wouldn’t take too much time. Check out these simple New Year’s activities below to incorporate into your first day back. 

Celebrate ‘Noon’ Year with your Class

You can create your own celebration with your class by celebrating Noon Year! Grab some New Years party gear (it should be discounted now that New Year’s Eve is over) and distribute them to your students. At noon on the first day back from break, you and your students can count down from 10 until the clock hits noon. When it’s noon, you can all say ‘Happy Noon Year!’ and blow kazoos. This is a really simple activity to celebrate New Year’s without compromising a great deal of instructional time!

Want a free headband to make with your class for Noon Year? Click the button below to grab the free template!

Create New Year’s Goals

Set goals with your students to celebrate the New Year! Goal-setting is an important skill to have anyway, so why not take advantage during the New Year? This is one of my favorite New Year’s activities and it’s a great way to practice writing skills. Students can write or draw what they would like to accomplish in the New Year and decorate a party hat to complement it. This New Year’s activity can easily be added to your writing block!

Teach your Students about the New Year

Use this flip book activity to teach your students about the New Year. They can also write their own resolutions for the New Year. This is a great activity to celebrate New Year’s Day that is also educational! Students will love to learn about the different New Year traditions around the world.

Celebrate New Year’s with Math Practice

Don’t want to spend a lot of time prepping a New Year’s activity? Use color by codes! Students can practice their math facts and then draw a picture of how they spent their New Year’s Eve on the back of their page! These make great independent activities for morning work or early finishers. You can read more about how I use color by codes in the classroom here!

I’ve created ready-to-go math color by codes for number sense, addition facts, and subtraction facts through 20. You can also find editable color by codes in this growing bundle!

I hope these New Year’s activities are useful in your classroom! Let me know if you use any of these activities with your students!

This is also a great time to build classroom community because students will be out of their routine. Reinforce those expectations as far as how students treat each other. Click the button below to read about ways to build classroom community.

Want some ways to work on classroom community?