Grade: Primary, Junior
Facility: Classroom, multipurpose room or gymnasium
Materials: Recycled paper, mouse pads or floor markers (islands)
Activity Description: Get your students up and moving quickly with this fun, physical activity which can easily be adapted into a magical Halloween game.
Overview:
- A variety of islands are spread out around the room.
- Students move around the room as quickly as possible.
- When the teacher calls out “Islands in 5-4-3-2-1”, the students have five seconds to be touching an island and freeze in a position. Student can share islands.
- Resume moving after all have found an island.
Add variations such as:
- Removing islands
- Limiting the number of islands that students can go to (all students with birthdays between January and June must find a BLUE island, everyone else must find a GREEN island)
- Defining the number of students who can share an island and asking students to incorporate specific criteria into their frozen position.
- Give all instructions while students continue to move around the room.
Magical Halloween variation:
- Cut out the islands in the shape of Halloween ghosts, goblins, athletes, superheros, animals and healthy trick or treat snacks.
- Limit the island a student can go to by asking questions such as: All those dressing up for Halloween as a ghost to find a ghost island or all those dressing up like a baseball player to find a blue island.
- Ask students to incorporate the pose from their favorite superhero, athlete or animal into their frozen position.
- Ask students to move around the room like the character they will be dressing up as for Halloween.
- Give all instructions while students continue to move around the room.
Source: Adapted from “Islands” from the Ontario HPE Curriculum Support: Junior Appendix B
