Learning how to be a friend and how to make friends are important skills for kids. Friendships are typically taught at the beginning of the year ,but I also like to do a friendship week at the end of year to celebrate the special friendships built throughout the year. Here are 7 End of Year Friendship Activities for kindergarten, 1st grade, and 2nd grade.
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Get the Friendship Venn Diagrams here!
End of Year Friendship Activities
Editable Donation Letter– Decide whether you’re going to do a Friendship Day or Friendship Week. If you’re doing an ABC Countdown to count down the days left of school, you could easily use a friendship theme for the letter F. Simply choose which donation letter you want to send home to families, fill in the date, and any items that you need for the activities, sign and send home! Easy! If you’re doing a Friendship Day, you can set up any of the activities as stations or rotations for student’s to complete throughout the school day. You could also do one activity a day for a Friendship Week!
Friendship Bracelets– These are always a hit! Put some chenille sticks, letter beads, pony beads, and a variety of different size straws for students to use to create a friendship bracelet. Cut the straws in various sizes. Students could create friendship bracelets for their friends or trade them with friends! It’s always so fun!
Students could also make life size friendship bracelets by using white paper plates! Cake size paper plates would be ideal for this but regular size paper plates work great, too. Write letters, vowel teams, digraphs, etc in the middle of the plates. Students can build vocabulary words, spelling words, or friends names on the floor! Anything life size is extra fun!
Thumb-body Gifts– This is my favorite activity! It makes the sweetest gift for students to take home at the end of the year. I love that this collaborative heart is a reminder that we are all different and unique! Students stamp their thumb prints on each friend’s paper and sign their name. I like these ink pads! You could make this a musical activity to get out those end of school year wiggles! To play, place a few different colored ink pads in the middle of each table group. Each student will need a pencil or marker on their desk.
1.Place one of the heart pictures in front of each student on their desk.
2. Start the music. Students will walk around/move to each student’s desk. (You decide what direction you want the class to rotate.)
3. Stop the music. Students write their name in the middle of the heart. Inform them that each student will sign the heart and to not use extra large letters. Keep their writing small. Then, students stamp one thumb in the ink pad and onto the outline of the heart. They will make one thumb print.
4. Start the music. Students walk around/move to each student’s desk.
5. Stop the music. Students write their name in the middle of the heart. Then, students stamp one thumb in the ink pad and onto the outline of the heart. They will make one thumb print.
6. Start the music and repeat the steps above. You will continue the steps above until each student has signed their name, stamped their thumb print on every student’s heart and has returned to the heart at their desk.
If you want students to stay in their seats, have them pass the paper to the student on their right or left when the music stops rather than moving seats.
Friend Post Cards– This is a great station activity! Students create a post card for a friend. They fill in the student’s name and note. You can put these free name cards with the post cards to help students spell their friend’s name. You will write in the student’s address and mail. How excited will students be when they receive a post card from their friend over the summer! I just LOVE these so much! I recommend printing the post cards on white card stock!
Get the FREE Editable Name Tag cards here!
Friendship Rocks– We love Friendship Rocks! We have a few in our flower beds around the house that my own children made many years ago. This is another easy and fun station activity. Students paint and decorate river rocks and exchange them with a friend. I like these river rocks, but Hobby Lobby also has some!
Friendship Shirt Gifts– A classic end of year activity! These also make great student gifts. Each student stamps their painted handprint on each classmates shirt and signs their name. Use the donation letter to ask families to donate white t-shirts or send in a white t-shirt for their child.
Autograph Hats– I love these, too! Another great end of year student gift. Students sign their name on each classmates hat. You can find hats at The Dollar Tree, Hobby Lobby and I believe I have also seen them at Michaels.
Friendship Venn Diagrams– I like to do these at the beginning of the school year but they also make a great end of year activity! Students compare and contrast their likes and differences. Students could use stickers or write their likes and differences. These always turn out PRECIOUS! I love them so much!
You can download the FREE End of Year Friendship activities here by entering your email! Don’t forget the Friendship Venn Diagrams here! They always turn out super cute! Oh, and grab the FREE editable Name Tags here!
Find my favorite Friendship Books here. Some of these are new to me this year!
Watch this video for End of Year Friendship activities!
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