The 100th day of school is a major milestone during the school year and a great excuse to celebrate with special activities. We have some suggestions on how to make the 100th day of school just as exciting as the first day! Kick off the 100th day in the K–1 classroom with these ideas:
Evan-Moor’s printable activities:
Kindergarten
Practice listening and speaking skills, drawing, comprehension, and making inferences with the provided story about the 100th day of school. Find this printable here.
Grades K–1
This ocean-themed math reader and counting maze are a fun way to get children counting to 100. Find this printable unit here.
Counting by 5s Printable
This printable sticks to the “100 theme” and guides students through various activities to count by 5s until reaching 100. Find this printable here.
Grade 1
100 Days of School Thinking Skills Printable
This printable guides students through counting, recognizing patterns, identifying consonants versus vowels, and developing critical thinking skills. Find this printable here.
Brown Bag Math Book Printable
This is a directional and template printable that explains an activity designed to help students grasp big numbers. Students in groups create sets of ten “things” on a page, ultimately coming together to create a math book with sets of 10 or 100. Find this printable here.
Hands-on Art and Building Projects
When I am 100 Activity: Have students create self-portraits of what they will look like when they are 100 years old. They can draw their portraits or create portraits with construction paper for wrinkled skin and cotton balls for white hair. To take this activity further, students can look into the future and answer prompts such as:
- “When I am 100 years old, my friends and I will. . .”
- “When I am 100 years old, I will eat lots of. . .”
- “When I am 100 years old, I will spend time. . .”
- “When I am 100 years old, I will look. . .”
Create a photobooth: Have students decorate a “100-themed” background for a 100th day of school photoshoot with their friends. I remember doing this activity in kindergarten, and I still have the photograph with my best friend to this day!
Make cheerio necklaces: Give each student a piece of yarn and 100 Cheerios. Have students string the 100 Cheerios onto their yarn to create a big necklace. It’s fun to eat, too!
Build structures with 100 objects: Have students build structures or buildings with 100 Legos, 100 plastic cups, or 100 popsicle sticks and glue.
Go outside for this 100 Seconds Challenge. Find this printable here.
- Arm circles
- 10 jumping jacks
- Twist
- Squats
- Hop on one foot
- Bounce a ball
List 100 things you’ve done or learned in the classroom:
Come together as a class and take turns listing 100 things that the students have done or learned in the classroom. Write these 100 things on a poster so students can proudly reflect on their learning and progress.
“100-themed” challenges:
- Challenge students to read 100 books leading up to the 100th day of school.
- Challenge students to take 100 steps each day.
- Challenge students to log 100 acts of kindness during the school year.
Make it a dress-up day:
For the 100th day of school, have students come to class dressed up as if they were 100 years old.
Dice-roll game: Have students roll a die 100 times. Have them tally or keep track of how many times they roll a 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, or 6. To take this activity to the next level, have the students graph their results.
Coin-flip game: Similarly to the dice-roll game, have students flip a coin 100 times and have them log how many times they flip a head or a tail. Students can also graph these results.
Add-to-100 game: Write a number on the board and have students call out what number would be added to equal 100. For example, if you wrote the number 82 on the board, students would call out the number 18.
Equation puzzle: For more advanced math, give students numbers and arithmetic operations. See if they can make an equation that equals 100 with the numbers provided using addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division.
There are plenty of ways to celebrate the 100th day of school with projects and games centered around art, math, physical exercise, and critical thinking skills. It is important to commemorate this day in the classroom because it encourages students to love learning and take pride in their accomplishments. Mark the 100th day of school on your calendars and don’t forget to incorporate our activities into your classroom this year!
For more 100 days of school ideas and printables across the PreK-6 curriculum, check out Evan-Moor’s TeacherFileBox. Get a free trial and print 50 pages of activities to use with your students!
Natalie Robinson is a recent Communication Studies graduate from LMU. She has a strong passion for writing and loves children. Having grown up in a Montessori school and later transitioning to public school, Natalie values early childhood education and believes that social and emotional learning should be a core tenet within all homes and classrooms. In writing for Evan-Moor, Natalie hopes to build a career in copywriting and copyediting.
Heather Foudy is a certified elementary teacher with over 7 years’ experience as an educator and volunteer in the classroom. She enjoys creating lessons that are meaningful and creative for students. She is currently working for Evan-Moor’s marketing and communications team and enjoys building learning opportunities that are both meaningful and creative for students and teachers alike.
Lisa Vitarisi Mathews serves as Publisher of Evan-Moor Educational Publishers. She has over 20 years’ experience in PreK–8 education, and has worked closely with teachers across the United States through Evan-Moor product training and workshops.
Keep in mind that a reading words-per-minute grade-level chart is a simple gauge and just one measurement tool used to identify students’ readiness. Every student learns in a unique way, at his or her own pace. If a child is not at grade level, focus on increasing his or her current score by 10 to 15 words by the end of the year, and then celebrate the successes!
Heather Foudy is a certified elementary teacher with over 7 years’ experience as an educator and volunteer in the classroom. She enjoys creating lessons that are meaningful and creative for students. She is currently working for Evan-Moor’s marketing and communications team and enjoys building learning opportunities that are both meaningful and creative for students and teachers alike.
Alphabet Hunt: An alphabet hunt is a fun and interactive way to teach letter and sound combinations. For beginning readers, matching objects with the same beginning and ending sounds reinforces this concept. Assign a letter of the week and have students find objects within the classroom that have the same beginning sound as the weekly letter. Depending on your class, you could assign more than one letter per week. (Students could also bring objects from home to share as well.)
Rhyming Phonics Game: Gather sets of rhyming objects to play the game “rhyme in a bag.” Split the sets, so half are placed in a paper bag and half are placed on a table. Have students reach into the bag, pull out an object, and match it to an item on the table that rhymes.
To make a blending flip book:
To make a word-family flip book: