The ghouls and goblins are slowly waking up from their slumber, the jack-o-lanterns are illuminating, and believe it or not, educational opportunities are creeping in like a spooky fog. You may not think of Halloween as a learning experience, but on the contrary, a Halloween game for the neighborhood kids or a Halloween lesson plan for your classroom can provide incredible growth and knowledge. We’ve compiled a list of some of the best mind-building games for the Halloween season.
- Get a little Batty
As the Halloween season opens, you can count on Dracula, Batman, and other bat-themed costumes to make an appearance. What better time to incorporate bats into the curriculum? You can teach your kids all about how bats aren’t quite as scary as they’re made out to be in the movies. You can even bring in a biologist to speak or show off one of the winged creatures.
- What’s in the Bowl?
This grotesque game is an exercise in imagination and creativity. This long-played game starts with a bowl covered with felt so that no one can see the content. Next, you can tell a story as the kids feel their way through the bowls or create a label beforehand—such as spaghetti labeled as zombie hair or grapes as eyeballs.
- Spooky Poetry
What better way to craft a Halloween horror story than through poetry. Your kids can have fun using creative language to describe monsters and ghouls or rhyme their way through a scary tale.
- Build-A-Scarecrow
Building a scarecrow is a great way to help foster teamwork, planning, creativity, and execution. Provide old flannel shirts, hay, bowties, burlap hats, and other materials to get the party started. You can split the group into 2 or 3 person teams to see who can create the best scarecrow in the allotted time.
- Write a Scary Broadcast
You can have your older students create a script for a “War of the Worlds” type of dialogue. They should think about the language and methods used in that broadcast to create widespread panic and try to replicate them in their own original pieces.
