I have always LOVED the Opening Day of Baseball season. Not only do I love baseball, but it also is the start of SPRING in my eyes. It is like a breath of fresh air…literally.
In my second or third year of teaching…before people were doing ROOM TRANSFORMATIONS…I started to do a big celebration for Opening Day! It started off as just decoration and doing some baseball math activities, but over the years it has grown into so much more!
A Few Days Before
A few days before our Opening Day celebration, I like to send home a notice that explains everything to the families. I also ask for a few parent volunteers. The parents only come in for about an hour (during our measurement/math rotation). I also send home a map and a list of all the baseball teams in MLB. The students have the option of looking it over before the big day!
I grab a few packs of hotdogs and buns at the grocery store. I gather up some yarn or string, some measuring tapes, and I ask parents to send in juice boxes if they would like. I also grab the Surveyor’s Wheel from the gym for long distance measuring.
The Big Day
For baseball day, the class wears their baseball gear and I give them a little eye black under their eyes when they arrive. I have a few baseball blankets and pieces of fabric so I “decorate” the tables and put out ALL of my BASEBALL books! This gets the EXCITED for a fun day. They start their day off with a baseball word search and word jumble. I copy a packet that they can use for the whole day which you can grab here.
Then the day begins! We do different activities that CENTER around BASEBALL all day long! Even the kids who are not sports fans get into it.
One of the activities includes breaking the class up into teams and doing 4-15 minute rotations.
- The kids hit a whifffle ball as far as they can, then they measure and record how far they hit it
- The kids measure out the distance from home plate to first base and cut a piece of string that long
- The kids measure out the distance from the pitchers mount to home plate and then practice throwing that far
- The kids work on some baseball math story problems.
This is so much fun to do outside if it is a nice day. Once in a while, opening day is cold or rainy and we just adjust to do the activities in the all-purpose rooms or the hallways.
Other Activities
Other activities we do on Baseball Day include the following:
-Locating the Teams on a Map of the United States Contest
-Opinion Writing (Choose People in your Life to Create a Baseball Team)
-Word Search/ Word Jumble
-Baseball Math Activities
-Read Baseball Books
-Make a Baseball Brochure
–Menu Math Baseball activities
A Shocking Baseball Snack
Last but not least, usually during their writing activity, I start up my trusty PANCAKE GRIDDLE. I throw a few packages of BALLPARK FRANKS on the griddle (if you don’t want to do this, you could do Cracker Jacks, Popcorn, Peanuts, etc) and the kids get all giddy. They CANNOT believe that I am grilling HotDogs in the classroom. I give them each a hot dog in a bun with ketchup or mustard and a juice box. You would think I gave them a million dollars…hahaha.
So it is a fantastic day with minimal prep. My students always bring it up if they come back to visit when they are older.
I hope you enjoy the start of spring and the start of the Baseball Season! You can grab my baseball day bundle right here if you are interested in trying it out!
~Heather Johnson 33
