Easy Ideas for a Halloween Math Party

$Try these easy ideas for a Halloween math party perfect for 2nd and 3rd grade! We practiced second and third grade math skills with pumpkins, spooky math center activities, and candy as place value manipulatives. #halloween #math #2ndgrade #3rdgrade$

Each year my teammate next door and I throw a Halloween math party. It’s become a yearly tradition that our kids love because it’s fun! We love it because everybody’s engaged and still learning, and our admin loves it because it’s standards based. Win-win-win! It’s always a huge hit with our second and third graders so I thought I’d share a few tricks to making your party a treat!

Invite a Buddy Class

We open our connecting door and let students roam between our rooms and choose stations to visit. Our only rule is that they have to be choosing a station or working at one rather than just wandering. This is never an issue because they get to Trick-or-Treat at each table as soon as they finish.

I love the festive look of a sea of orange! We cover all of the tables and set everything up while students are at lunch. There are always lots of oohs and aahs when they walk in the door! For our Halloween math parties we like to enlist the help of parent volunteers to monitor each station.

Get kids up and moving

Project task cards on the whiteboard, tape game cards around the room, and use activities that students can do in pairs. It’s a great time to build social skills plus, if you invite a buddy class, you probably don’t have room for everyone to be seated .

Set up Spooky Stations

I set up Halloween math centers at tables around the room for kids to practice the skills we’ve been working on.

FrankenLine is always a favorite and my kids think it’s hilarious that his scar is a number line!

Be creative with Dollar Store Finds

Witch fingers, zombie eyeballs, and anything else you can incorporate from the Dollar Store ups the fun factor and is easy to fit into games. Glue witch fingers onto existing spinners with E6000 glue. Halloween candy or small party favors make great math manipulatives and you can usually find holiday themed chip and dip trays that are perfect for place value.

I’m always on the lookout for fun chip and dip trays. This haunted house one works great for our Halloween math games. I like to use candy for math manipulatives, but before we start everybody has to pinky promise they won’t sneak and eat it. Lots of little fingers will be touching it!

As an added incentive and a little extra fun, our students get to trick or treat at each table after they’ve finished the activity. Parents send in party favor type things and I pick up a few clearance items after Halloween to save for the following year.

And there you have it! Math parties are such a fun way to tame the excitement and keep everyone focused.

You can find the Halloween math centers I use here:

$Halloween math centers for second and third grade$