Fun and Engaging Classroom Pumpkin Activities
Every year as October rolls around, I like to incorporate the changing season into my classroom. Being mindful that not all families celebrate Halloween, I often focus on simply pumpkins. It still gets the kids excited about the Autumn season, and I am able to easily incorporate fun and engaging classroom pumpkin activities into literacy, writing, science, and math standards!
There are many different ways to incorporate pumpkins into your classroom! You might incorporate books about pumpkins into your current comprehension skill or you might focus on science standards but relate them to pumpkins. You could even celebrate with a pumpkin-themed day called Pumpkin Day! If you are able to invite parent volunteers into the classroom, you could set up pumpkin science experiments and have students rotate through the different stations. Regardless of how you would like to incorporate a pumpkin study into your classroom, I have many ideas for fun and engaging classroom pumpkin activities!
Pumpkin Literacy Activities
When studying pumpkins, you might choose to incorporate pumpkin-themed books into your literacy instruction.
Spookley the Square Pumpkin is a fun, seasonal tale to share with your students. It’s about a pumpkin who comes in an unusual shape. The other pumpkins make fun of him due to his shape, but eventually, Spookley and the other pumpkins come to see the benefits of his uniqueness. This book is great for teaching characters, settings, and events, as well as theme. The book was also made into a short movie.
Pumpkin Jack is a wonderful book to teach about the pumpkin life cycle. It has beautiful illustrations and goes a superb job at incorporating the life cycle of a pumpkin into a story. It’s about a boy who has a pumpkin, carves it, and watches it go through the pumpkin life cycle. This book would be great for teaching story events, sequencing, and retelling.
Pumpkin Town! doesn’t seem to be well known but it’s one of my favorite pumpkin stories to read each year! It can be used to teach characters, settings, and events and offers the perfect opportunity for students to practice sequencing and retelling. In the book, a group of brothers plant pumpkins and collect the seeds. One night, a big gust of wind blows through and carries the pumpkin seeds everywhere. As a result, pumpkins grow EVERYWHERE throughout the town! The brothers have to work together to solve the town’s problem.
Pumpkin Circle is a wonderful non-fiction text about the life cycle of a pumpkin. It uses photographs to teach the life cycle of a pumpkin. It’s a great read-aloud for any pumpkin or the life cycle of a plant unit.
Teaching the Parts of a Pumpkin and the Pumpkin Life Cycle
While incorporating rich texts about pumpkins into your literacy instruction, you might also want to include emergent readers about pumpkins or reading comprehension passages about pumpkins. After learning about pumpkins, students can practice alphabetical order skills using pumpkin vocabulary skills or label the parts of a pumpkin after reading about them.
After students learn about parts of a pumpkin and the life cycle of a pumpkin through texts, they can label parts of a pumpkin and sequence the steps in a pumpkin’s life cycle through worksheets and hands-on crafts!
Students can even make a diagram of a pumpkin craft and label the parts of a pumpkin.
Pumpkin Science Activities
After learning about pumpkins, students can participate in fun and engaging classroom pumpkin activities including exploring numerous science standards! Students can rotate to different stations to explore adjectives, weight, measurement, circumference, floating and sinking, counting, and taste! If desired, students can record their findings in a pumpkin booklet!
Pumpkin Math Activities
Numerous math skills can be incorporated into a pumpkin study! Students can taste a variety of products made from pumpkins, vote on their favorite, graph the data, and analyze the data.
If you are teaching a pumpkin unit, I’ve put together these fun and engaging classroom pumpkin activities into a Pumpkin Literacy, Math, and Science Activities packet intended for Kindergarten, First Grade, or Second Grade students.
Here Is What Is Included:
Pumpkin Literacy Activities
- Pumpkins Emergent Reader
- Pumpkins Text Evidence Passage
- Pumpkins Text Evidence Passage Answer Key
- Pumpkins Reading Passage
- Pumpkins Reading Check
- Pumpkins Reading Check Answer Key
- Pumpkins Organizer
- Pumpkins Can, Have, Are Organizer
- Pumpkins Writing Organizer
- Pumpkins VS. Oranges Organizer
- Jack-o’-lanterns Organizer
- Jack-o’-lanterns Can, Have, Are Organizer
- Pumpkins VS. Jack-o’-lanterns Organizer
- Pumpkin ABC Order Activity
- Pumpkin ABC Order Activity Answer Key
Parts of a Pumpkin Activities
- Parts of a Pumpkin Vocabulary Cards (in color and grayscale)
- Parts of a Pumpkin Labeling Sheet with Word Bank
- Parts of a Pumpkin Labeling Sheet with Word Bank Answer Key
- Parts of a Pumpkin Labeling Sheet
- Parts of a Pumpkin Labeling Sheet Answer Key
- Parts of a Pumpkin Organizer
- Label a Pumpkin Craft
Life Cycle of a Pumpkin Activities
- Life Cycle of a Pumpkin Activities
- Life Cycle of a Pumpkin Vocabulary Cards (with clipart – in color and grayscale)
- Life Cycle of a Pumpkin Vocabulary Cards (with pictures – in color and grayscale)
- Life Cycle of a Pumpkin Poster (in color and grayscale)
- Life Cycle of a Pumpkin Craft
- Life Cycle of a Pumpkin Sequencing Sheet
- Life Cycle of a Pumpkin Sequencing Sheet Answer Key
- Life Cycle of a Pumpkin Sequencing Chart
Math Activities
- Pumpkin Product Tasting Activity
- Math Graphing Idea
- Pumpkin Products Parent Letter
- Pumpkin Products Class Graph Materials
- Pumpkin Products Student Graph
- Pumpkin Craft
Pumpkin Day/Pumpkin Science and Math Experiments
- Pumpkin Experiment Stations Descriptions
- Pumpkin Day Parent Letter
- Pumpkin Exploration Station Posters (in color and grayscale)
- My Pumpkin Book for Experiment Stations
Website and Book Suggestions
All Answer Keys Are Included
I hope you and your students will enjoy these fun and engaging classroom pumpkin activities! If you would like to grab a copy of these activities to use with your students, you can find them here. Enjoy!
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