What Can I do to Celebrate Birthdays in the Classroom?

  • Have a Happy Unbirthday Party
    • Choose a day at the beginning of the year, before anyone has a birthday and plan a party for the afternoon. Buy a cake or cupcakes, play party games, and sing happy unbirthday to the whole class. Encourage parents not to bring treats through the rest of the year for birthdays. Just a simple “happy birthday” to each student will do for the rest of the year.
  • Make a Happy Birthday Book
    • On piece of paper have each student write out “For your birthday, I would like to give you _________.”, and then draw a picture to go with it. Or you can ask them to write out “Happy Birthday _________. My wish for you is ___________________.” Staple all the pages together, add a title page and give it to the birthday person as a special present from the class.
  • Birthday Certificate
    • Make a birthday certificate on the computer, “Happy Seventh Birthday________! Have a super day!” You can also buy them at many teacher supply stores. Then sign it, add some stickers to it, and laminate it.
  • V.I.P for the Day
    • The most popular way to celebrate birthday! Have the birthday person perform duties to help the class out and give them special privileges.
  • Birthday Box (idea by Lisa Schmidman)
    • Cover a good size shoe box with bright children’s wrapping paper so the lid can be removed. Inside put a cupcake (you can bake them ahead of time and freeze them), can of frosting, sprinkles, a plastic knife, a birthday napkin, sticker, card, a class birthday book (pictures/good wishes that the class draws on half sheets of paper and bound with yarn), and a small gift. The box is kept in a visible location and then on the morning of a birthday it is moved to the birthday child’s desk (remember to thaw the cupcake the day before). At a designated time, the class sings, the child skips around the room, and gets to open the box.
  • Birthday Mobile
    • On a coat hanger put the child’s name and a picture of the child. On small pieces of paper in the shape of birthday cakes ask each student in the class to write out “For your birthday, I would like to give you ______.” In the meantime, ask birthday person to write out their birthday wishes on pieces of paper in the shape of candles. The number of wishes they get corresponds to the age that they just turned. Tie these cakes and candles with string to the coat hanger.