Birthdays are a special day for kids! Taking time to acknowledge and celebrate student birthdays in the classroom is important but can be a lot of work. Looking for simple birthday classroom ideas that that won’t take too much time or money? Keep reading for 8 easy ideas that will make your students feel special and help build a sense of classroom community.
Birthday Display
Displaying classroom birthdays can make students feel special and also help you keep track of them! This can be as fancy or simple as you want. If you have the space and time you can create a birthday bulletin board. Don’t have the room? Just display birthdays month by month. I once inherited a huge birthday set from a retiring teacher that I didn’t have the room to display. Instead I took the monthly birthday cupcakes and added them one at a time (month by month) to my calendar area. You can even do something as easy as laminating half a page of astro-brights paper and listing birthdays each month. For more Birthday display ideas read here.
Birthday Books
This is one of my favourite ways to celebrate student birthdays! Birthday Books really make students feel special and help build a sense of community. They are simply a little book the class makes for students celebrating a birthday. This does not have to be fancy or labor intensive! Most years I just gave students half a page of plain paper to write Happy Birthday! (student name) and draw a picture. You could also have students write a little note or things they appreciate about the student. I used a store bought birthday certificate as the cover and stapled it on top of all the student pages. These make treasured keepsakes… I have had past students of mine tell me they still have their Birthday Book years later!
Birthday Crowns
Nothing makes any kid feel more special than wearing a crown! You can buy these all ready to go from a teacher store or amazon. Or make your own. Write Happy Birthday and add a few stickers to a sentence strip for a DYI version.
Birthday Gifts
You might choose to give a small gift to students on their birthday. Inexpensive items from the dollar store or Amazon like a pencil, crazy straw, pop it or bracelet all make fun gifts. Buy a class set or a few of each and let students choose their birthday treasure. Another idea is to use your book order bonus points to collect picture books for student birthday gifts.
Birthday Read Alouds
This is an idea that kinda took a life of it’s own! It all started one year when I let my students choose a story of their choice, to be read aloud on their birthday. One student choose Moira’s Birthday by Robert Munch and after that every student chose it for their birthday read aloud. I read it many times that year! After that I started collecting more birthday themed books and soon had a bin of birthday books for students to choose from. Celebrating with books…. a teacher approved birthday classroom idea!
Celebrate Summer Birthdays
This is a fun thing to do on one of your last days of school. Have a little “birthday party”… with a treat, sing happy birthday to all the summer birthday kids and make their birthday books.
Birthday Printables
Some birthday themed printables like… coloring pages, word searches or dot to dots are a fun addition to a birthday celebration. You can make a little booklet for the birthday student to take home or work on while students make their Birthday Book. These also make a fun activity for your year end/summer birthday celebration.
All the Classroom Birthday Things! (in one spot)
Or make things easy on yourself and get everything you need for celebrating classroom birthdays all in one spot! If you would like to check out my Birthdays Made Easy resource just click below to find it in my TPT store.
