Engaging Halloween Math Activities
Every teacher knows that it’s hard to contain the energy and excitement of children around Halloween time. Whether it’s the constant chatter about costumers, or the aftermath of too much sugar, it can be difficult to keep students focused and engaged. Capitalizing on the holiday excitement with themed games and activities can get students excited about learning and practicing standards-based skills.
If you have a fall or Halloween class party, you can consider having an escape room as one of the activity. One of my favorite things about using educational escape rooms around holidays is that the nature of the activity creates a sense of excitement and even intrigue. I’ve had several teachers tell me that their students didn’t even realize they were doing math because they were so focused on the storyline and the tasks, and they were actually having fun while reviewing standards! If you use a breakout activity at your fall/autumn class party you could use it as a station, whole class, or by students in small groups. You can create your own with some of the tips found on our website, or you can shop for some of our pre-made Halloween escape rooms for students in 1st-6th grades. These activities are based on math skills that most school systems teach at the beginning of the school year. *None of the activities specifically mention Halloween and do not include any mention of costumes, trick-or-treating, or jack-o-lanterns, so they are appropriate for use any time in the fall even at schools that do not celebrate Halloween.
In our first grade version of Capture the Candy Corn Man, students race to add and subtract single digits and use their knowledge of place value (ones and tens) to catch a mischievous runaway candy corn.
- The Great Pumpkin Heist is the theme of our 2nd grade fall/Halloween escape room. Students race to find the pumpkins by creating three digit numbers from place blocks, comparing numbers with greater than, less than, and equals signs, regrouping ones, tens, and hundreds, and more!
- The Candy Corn Man returns in the single-digit multiplication escape room focusing on multiplying by 2, 5, and 10. Colorful puzzles and arrays make multiplying fun in this 3rd grade math escape room.
- Place value & pumpkins take center stage in the 4th grade math escape room, “The Great Pumpkin Heist.” Rounding, comparing numbers written in different forms, and understanding the value of a digit will come into play as students take on the mission of recovering the pumpkins.
- Our 5th grade fall/Halloween-themed escape room is a version shares the pumpkin heist theme with the fourth and second grade escape rooms, but with fifth grade math standards. Students complete rounding challenges, multiply and divide by powers of 10, compare the values of decimal numbers, and much more.
- Our “Quick Escape” Powers of 10 has students using 5th grade standard 5.NBT.A.2 to escape the haunted house by using their understanding of multiplying and dividing by powers of 10.
- Rates and ratios are the math topics addressed in our 6th grade math escape room, “Escape Horatio’s Haunted House.” This breakout is perfect for Halloween time, but can be used any time of year. The challenging puzzles have students solving rates and ratios using tape diagrams, tables, and more!
