Scheduling Halloween for your school

Scheduling Halloween for your school

Halloween is fast approaching and SBMs need to start planning for the huge festival. Scheduling Halloween for your school can be quite difficult for SBMs as staff plan separately for their class. However, Halloween should be considered as something to involve the whole school, with joint activities and assemblies. It is a perfect festival to create a fun learning environment that is more relaxed as the October break is near.

To assist SBMs with scheduling Halloween, we have created some school Halloween ideas. Find some tips on how to schedule these ideas and get ready for Halloween in your school.

Plan a Halloween themed event

This is a great activity to schedule for your school as it will be a large event of your choice that celebrates Halloween. It may be costly, however; it is perfect to get the whole school involved with Halloween. You can plan anything from a crafts event to a Halloween fun day or even an outdoors Halloween event. These will all involve outside companies to bring it together and even maybe educational talks around the subject. You must also consider decorating and scheduling when to start the set-up period of the event.

To make the event extra special, invite parents and guardians and raise money for a local charity charging a small entrance fee to start the donations.

Create a school show

Plan with staff a Halloween school show to put on to parents as part of scheduling Halloween for your school. This can be singing and dancing and acting out Halloween songs or based on Halloween TV shows, films and plays. Get staff volunteers on board to assist with the show process and allocate the lead planner who can structure and direct children. A Halloween school show is perfect to get children involved in pop culture and have lots of fun performing and rehearsing.

A lot of dedication is put into a school show, and SBMs must consider props, lighting, costumes, set equipment, sound etc.

To assist you with the set, try our role play panels. For costumes, get staff and parents to make some and purchase our masks to finish the costumes off.

Create some posters to put around the school detailing audition times and when the show is. Gain money back for the school that you use to create the show by having ticket fees to the show.

Schedule Halloween history lessons

Plan out some historical lessons based on Halloween that you can give to staff to ensure the school covers the same topics. This will include how Halloween started and some of the past traditions and customs that used to be associated with the holiday. Include how other cultures celebrate Halloween too such as Dia De Los Muertos. For older students consider delving into the Salem witch trials as this is a huge part of history and connects to Halloween.

Provide an information pack with lesson ideas to staff so that every class covers the important history of Halloween on the lead up to the festival.

Create and develop a policy

Create a policy that covers Halloween and festivals for teachers to refer to when they are approaching. This should include areas that can be covered, cultural appropriation (particularly for costuming) and how to avoid this and vague ideas that staff can do individually with their class that fits with the school's brand. This ensures that every class is on school brand with what they do for certain key festivals.

Hold a Halloween costume competition

Dressing up is the highlight of Halloween for many children so incorporate this into your scheduling. Children also love a competition where they can win something as it gives them motivation to join in and plus, they find it fun to compete against one another. This makes a Halloween costume competition one of the best school Halloween ideas. Your staff may usually hold a dress up competition separately but why not recreate what they do on a larger, more competitive scale?

Consider what prizes are going to be awarded and how many winners there will be. Think if you want one 1st prize and then 2nd and 3rd prizes or if you want one person from each class to win something. Think about the age range in your school and what prize they will be most interested in. You could have prizes like a Halloween craft bag for children to do at home, helping to decorate their house for Halloween. If you want to award 1st prize 2nd and 3rd prizes, consider awarding a trophy too.

Ensure to advertise the Halloween costume competition by creating and pinning up posters around your school. Whatever you have chosen for prizes should be clearly stated in the posters to excite students. Then make your staff aware of the competition and involve them by allowing them to vote for their favourite costume from their class. This is perfect for a winner from every class. Hold a special assembly at the end of the day for students to flaunt their Halloween outfits to the whole school and to award the chosen winners.

Have a Halloween activity day

Organise a Halloween activity day for students to participate in. Use a large space such as the school hall to hold activities in so that multiple classes can be doing activities together. Think about Halloween themed activities that you can host such as pumpkin carving, Halloween crafts and various Halloween games. Provide some spooky snacks too whilst children are enjoying the activities.

Some Halloween game ideas can include:

• Guess the Halloween figure- like Pictionary, get students to take turns in sculpting Halloween figures. The rest of the group must guess what it is. Use our Halloween modelling playdough for children to sculpt with.
• Pumpkin noughts & crosses- set up a table with pumpkins on it. Draw noughts and crosses on each one and set up a grid on the table.
• Catch the ghost marshmallow- tie marshmallows to an elevated pole (a broom will do) with string. Students must hold their hands behind their backs and try to get the marshmallows with their mouths.
• Halloween treasure hunt- set up a treasure hunt throughout the hall that can start as soon as students walk in. Leave clues for them to find and hide sweets and chocolate for them to win.

Plan a Halloween fair

Similar to the activity day, plan a Halloween fair where the main difference is that it is student-led. Gather older students to volunteer to come up with ideas for stalls in the fair and create them. Split them into small groups and allow them to choose who to work with and set a budget for each group. Assist with getting supplies for everyone but let students drive what they need and budget it themselves. Let them set up their chosen stall and decorate it accordingly. Plan out a chosen charity you would like the school to support and let students know what their stalls will be raising money for. This will give them the drive to create their stalls and have fun with it.

The stalls can be anything from Halloween gifts, crafts, baked goods, to games. It will be entirely up to the students. Reserve a day where they can use the hall for their fair and the whole school can come spend some money and have fun throughout the day. Encourage the students running the stalls to dress up too for some extra fun. With this, children learn vital skills such as budgeting, money handling when people pay (may need to give change) and they even develop their creativity skills by coming up with the idea and decorating their stall.

Host a Halloween party

Consider throwing a school Halloween party where everyone can come together and have some spooky fun. Budget what you will need for it to happen and plan out a suitable time, this may be an after-school party. Set out how you want the party to be and hold a meeting with your staff to inform them of this. In this meeting, ask for staff volunteers to assist with setting the party up and chaperoning the children. Give them all the information they need in written form (such as a leaflet) that they can pass on to their class.

The party can be a costume party with games and activities as well as the standard music and dancing. Source food that suits the Halloween theme and drinks too. Food and drinks can be quite costly so to cut down on the budget for your school, let parents, staff and even yourself create part of the buffet. Ask for as much help as possible and create a tick box option that outlines what they would like to make. This prevents having too much of the same food.

Don’t forget to tailor the party depending on the age range of your school.

Organise decorations for the school

Plan out how you would like the school corridors and walls to be decorated now that Halloween is approaching. This year Halloween falls on a Monday, and for some schools this is after the October half term. Due to this, students could be in school on Halloween so making the school Halloween ready with spooky displays is essential. Decorations can also encourage students to get involved with activities and gets them in the Halloween mood.

Source materials your school will need to complete displays and decoration such as orange tissue paper, poster paper in a Halloween colour, and black card border roll. Create various displays for Halloween and have staff to help you as they will also be setting up their classroom displays.

Make a Halloween themed book festival

Hire an outside book company or use one that you have used before, to come into the school to showcase different Halloween books. They can use a smaller space and set up their books around the room where children can walk around and see what they are interested in.

Set up some book themed activities to go alongside the books to make students more interested. The company can also read a popular book out to the students so they can gain a love of books. The aim of this activity would be to engage children in reading and get them excited about it. Plus, books are always a perfect way to celebrate any festival.

Students can get leaflets from the company with the books that they have seen in it to take home. Parents can then order their child’s favourite book and send the slip back to the school. You can then pass these slips onto the company and give the books to children when they arrive. If you notice an extremely popular book amongst students, then consider purchasing some copies for the school.

Budget for Halloween

Once you have decided on which school activities to hold for scheduling Halloween for your school, you must budget carefully. Research thoroughly how much each activity will cost the school and plan to fit this into your budget. Try and find lower cost options or deals for bulk materials to help save on expenses.

Get your school prepared and ready for Halloween and ensure that you carefully plan out chosen activities so that they run smoothly. Scheduling Halloween for your school will be easier with this guidance and will help to reduce the stress of preparing for major festivals. Remember to consider your school budget throughout planning and loop staff and parents in where necessary.

With Christmas around the corner, you may need to also start thinking about how to schedule Christmas for your school. Read our helpful tips in our Christmas already? blog.