Activities for September: 8 Fun Classroom Ideas for Upper Elementary

It’s back to school time! Maybe you’ve already started your year, or maybe you are just gearing up to head back to your classroom. Either way, this time of year is full of transitions and excitement for all. It is bittersweet to end another beautiful summer and begin a new year of adventure. September is filled with opportunities to get to know our students and spark interest in learning. Thankfully, these activities for September are the perfect way to engage your upper elementary students right off the bat!

Fun September Activities for Upper Elementary Classrooms

#1: Back to School Activities for September

The first few weeks of school are super busy! You have to take care of so many housekeeping items and build routines and structures. You need high-quality activities that are both academic and engaging. Luckily, This Back to School No Prep Skills Review Pack is full of engaging activities for reading and math.

It is just what you need for those first few weeks of school. Reviewing content is a great activity for September! It allows the student to reflect on content taught the previous year and gives the teacher valuable insight into what students know and don’t know. The best part is, with these activities for September, your students will be actively engaged while completing academic material that is meaningful.

Reading Skills

Many students experience a slide in their reading skills over the summer. This is why it is important to review reading skills at the beginning of the year. Teachers need to know which skills they may need to re-teach. Of course, the last thing students want is to come to school and do boring review. Thankfully, this pack covers several reading skills in exciting ways!

There is an artsy color by code that reviews grammar skills, a fun roll-and-write story, back to school crossword reviews, and so much more!

Math Skills

Math is such a foundational subject. When students come back to school after summer, they need a bit of review before diving into new material. This Back to School No Prep Skills Review Pack allows students to practice math in a fun way!

Students will work on telling time and elapsed time, practice with number and shape patterns, and multiplication color by code. Additionally, they will work on adding and subtracting larger numbers with a fun back to school secret word puzzle and plenty of other math skills!

Activities for September: 4th Grade Back to School Activities

These review sheets are perfect for keeping skills sharp! They are great for independent work or small group activities. They are a great addition to add to your list of fun activities for September.

#2: September Morning Message

Teachers need their students to be engaged as much as possible. Especially in the morning! Using fun activities for September that are specific to the morning time will start your day off with ease.

Mornings in the classroom can be crazy! You are trying to greet your students, get them started for the day, check emails, communicate with the office, complete lunch counts, and so much more. It is important to get them started with a good morning routine at the beginning of the year. September Morning Messages are an excellent way to create a solid morning routine.

Your students will know exactly what your morning expectations are with this 25-slide resource. For each day of the month, the morning message contains the date, a daily quote, questions of the day, and an area for your to-do list. Have students write about the question of the day or spark interest with a quick class discussion over the daily quote. Honestly, there are so many ways to use the information on the slides to get students ready for the day.

The morning messages also include fun BITMOJI’s to kick the day off right! Students love seeing their teacher’s BITMOJI displayed each day. Each slide is editable, so you will be able to make any adjustments you need. There are also fun BITMOJI Morning Message sets you can check out!

The best part is your students will enter the room and immediately begin working independently. You will be able to check off your morning to-do list without the chaos.

These morning messages are the perfect activity for September.

#3: Back to School Digital Stickers

Students are such suckers for cool stickers, so why not use digital stickers! With so much digital grading and distance learning, digital stickers are just what you need! These Back to School themed stickers will add next-level excitement to all of your activities! They are such a cute way to encourage your students and remind them how awesome they are. Adding digital stickers to your activities for September is a fun way to kickstart the year! Trust me, you’re going to want to use them all year long!

Get set up for the entire year with this Seasonal Digital Stickers Bundle. It includes everything you need to motivate and reward your students all year long. All you have to do is copy and paste them into student work. They stay bright, shiny, and sticky for years to come!

Grab these back to school digital stickers to liven up your activities for September.

#4: Speller’s Choice Menu

Spelling can be a struggle for so many students. It’s also hard to add excitement to spelling practice. You’re probably tired of looking for new activities every week, and your students are tired of completing the same old thing over and over. Luckily, these Speller’s Choice Menus will bring excitement to your spelling lesson!

Students LOVE using choice menus for spelling because they allow students to take an active role in their learning. They feel like they are in charge and have a voice. So important! There are over 96 different activities with matching printable activity pages. This means you will never have to search for meaningful spelling activities again!

These fun spelling choice boards while add fun and variety to your ELA lessons.

Additionally, each activity can be used with any word list and can easily be woven into your daily routine. Honestly, you will be all set for the ENTIRE YEAR!

#5: Character Education Traits

Our kids experience so many different influences today from their peers and social media. Teaching character education has never been more important. Our kids need to know what it means to be a good citizen. They need to learn about values like respect, honesty, integrity, and more. This year-long character traits bundle provides a full 10 weeks of activities!

The lessons are perfect for incorporating into your daily morning meeting routines and even sub plans. Character traits are a great addition to your activities for September. Introducing character traits at the beginning of the year will lead to a caring classroom community for months to come!

Each lesson has everything you need to dive deep into the character trait. There is a classroom poster, an introduction for students, mentor text, comprehension questions, and a choice board jam-packed with extension activities. With this set, you can teach each character trait monthly or pick and choose lessons to teach throughout the year. Everything you need to encourage and build good character in your classroom is included!

Our kids are exposed to so many things in today's world. These character education traits lessons are perfect to incorporate in your classroom.

#6: Location and Map Skills

Do you teach map skills or community? This engaging resource was designed for your students to understand their location on a map. Additionally, it covers where they live in regard to the rest of the country and why it is important to know your own address.

The U.S. geography resource includes a pre-test, a book of maps, and a physical address and mailing address section. Other pages include where I live in relation to our planet, hemisphere, continent, country, US region, state, county, and city. The graphic organizer is also perfect to use as a visual summary.

Toward the end of the unit, you can assess student understanding of map skills with the included post-test. Students love to see where they live on a map and just how big the rest of the world really is. This map skills resource makes the perfect activity for September!

Location and Map Skills Unit

#7: Genre Posters

No classroom is complete without some fun decor. However, teachers love for their classroom decor to also be meaningful. Thankfully, genre posters are multi-purpose. They are super fun, and cute, and will brighten up your classroom walls. However, the posters also include academic information on reading genres that your students can use as a reference throughout the year.

You can display these near your classroom library, create a fun wall display, or even use it as bulletin board decor. Use the half-page posters to create a word wall or the interactive notebook printables for quick student reference. It even comes with genre labels for your classroom book bins!

No matter how you choose to decorate your classroom with the genre posters, your students will love being reminded of all the reading genres to choose from!

These genre posters are great to be used for classroom decor or reading centers.

#8: High-Interest Close Reads

Diving into reading at the beginning of the year can be tough. Teachers want their students to enjoy reading, so they are always looking for super interesting texts. Luckily, these close reading passages and activities are high-interest and engaging!

This resource is the perfect tool to help students practice close reading skills during the month of September. Topics include hurricanes, monarch butterfly migration, emojis and emoticons, deadliest animals, and remembering 9/11. These week-long lessons follow a close reading model, and each one includes a teacher guide and notes to make teaching the lesson easy! 

Emojis and Emoticons Close Reading Lesson
Deadliest Animals Close Reading Lesson Plan
September Close Reading Lessons for Grades 3, 4, 5

These close reading activities will help students practice making logical inferences, citing textual evidence, and drawing conclusions from the text. The close reading passages and activities include everything you need to teach 5 weeks of close reading lessons! Honestly, students will gain loads of exciting knowledge from each close reading passage!

Looking for even more activities for September?

Wanting even more ideas for back-to-school fun? Check out this deeply discounted Back to School Bundle. It has everything you need to get your year started on the right foot. The bundle is great for so many things like open house, meet the teacher, the first day of school, the first week of school, and so much more.

You will get:

  • Back to School Forms, Letters, and Checklists
  • Parent and Student Editable Brochure
  • Parent and Student Editable Flipbook
  • Back to School Slideshow
  • Classroom Newsletter Templates for the Entire Year
  • Monthly Calendar Templates

These editable resources will save you so much precious time! You will be able to relax and focus on what really matters most….your students!

Back to School Editable Bundle

Save these activities for September!

Save this list of fun activities for September to your favorite back to school board! You will be able to come back to this list when you are ready to implement engaging and fun lessons during September!

Fun September Activities for Upper Elementary Classrooms

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