End of Year Math Activities for Upper Elementary
The end of the school year is in sight and you and your students are probably counting down the days until summer. You have covered all of the math standards and taken all of the tests.
Now is a great time to plan some fun end of year math activities and projects to do with your class! This is a great way to review important concepts, keep students engaged, and end the year in a memorable way.
Here are some of my favorite end of year math activities to do with upper elementary students.
Million Dollar Project
The million dollar project is a fun and interactive end of year math activity to do with your class. This project starts by giving your students an imaginary budget of one million dollars.
First, students use the money to make four required purchases. After making their required purchases they are allowed to spend the remaining money however they choose.
Students will add and subtract decimals to keep track of their spending as they go. They are sure to be surprised when they get a firsthand look at what exactly a million dollars can get them.
Not only is this end of year math activity a great review of decimal operations, but it also helps students understand the value of money and budgeting.
Your students will love getting the chance to be a millionaire for a day! They will be so engaged they will probably ask you for more math time so they can keep working.
Design a Food Truck
Give your students a taste of entrepreneurship by having them design their own food trucks.
In this project, students get to plan their own food truck, working on everything from the food truck name and logo, to the menu and prices, buying ingredients and supplies, and even the food truck layout and marketing.
This end of year activity is a highly engaging way for students to apply a variety of math skills to a real world situation. Students will scale recipes, add decimals, calculate area and perimeter, find volume, convert measurements, and determine per unit costs and menu prices.
If you have the time, it is fun to give students a chance to bring their idea to life by building a 3D model of their food truck. Students use nets of prisms to create furniture and appliances for the interior of their food truck. This is a hands-on way for them to work with volume.
Grab the DESIGN A FOOD TRUCK project HERE
I am always amazed to see the level of creativity and depth of thinking students put into this design a food truck project!
This end of year activity is a great way to bring math to life and show your students how they can apply what they’ve learned in the classroom to real-world situations.
Plan a Popsicle Cart Business
When the weather warms up nothing is better than an ice-cold popsicle! Let your students go wild with creativity as they plan their own popsicle cart business!
This project based learning unit is the perfect seasonal activity that will give students a taste of setting up a business, creating their own unique popsicle flavors, surveying their customers about their favorite flavor choices, looking at expenses and how to make a profit, scaling recipes, and advertising a business.
While this unit is super fun and engaging, it is also packed full of math content! Your students will work with decimals, fractions, surveys, data, graphing, measurement conversions and more!
As a bonus, you could taste test some popsicles at school with your students or have students create their unique popsicle recipe at home to share with their families!
Grab this “cool” popsicle cart math activity HERE!
This end of year math activity will have your students craving popsicles and extra math time so they can keep working on their projects!
Magic Square Puzzles
Magic square puzzles are a great way to add a spin of magic to your end of year math activities!
Magic square puzzles challenge students to arrange a set of numbers into a square so that each row and column add up to the same sum.
It’s a fun way to practice mental math skills and flexibility with numbers, while also giving your students a chance to use their problem-solving and critical thinking skills.
These ready to go magic square puzzles are perfect for upper elementary students!
This set of 20 puzzles is provided in both printable and digital form, so you can use them in a variety of ways!
CLICK HERE to see these magic square puzzles.
End-of-Year Math Challenge Questions
Fermi math questions are fun and challenging end of year math activities that your students will love!
These types of questions, named after physicist Enrico Fermi, are designed to get your students thinking outside the box and using their problem-solving skills to tackle seemingly impossible questions.
Questions like “how many kernels of popcorn would it take to fill a bathtub?” or “how many blue jays would equal the weight of a car?” will have your students working independently or with a partner to make a plan, estimate, calculate, and come up with a ballpark answer.
Not only are these questions a fun challenge for your students, but they also help to reinforce essential math concepts like estimation, problem-solving, and critical thinking.
You can create a question and work on it together as a class or you can have your students come up with their own challenging questions to solve.
Want to grab some ready to go questions and challenge question printables to use as end of year math activities with your class?
CLICK HERE to go see math challenges focused on themes like food, animals, and sports.
Whether you’re looking for a way to review key math concepts, challenge your students to think outside the box, or simply add a little fun to your end of year math plans, these activities are sure to create a memorable end of the year.
Use the links below to see more details about each of these end of year math activities!
Design a Food Truck PBL Project
Open Ended Math Challenges – Fermi Questions
Looking for more end of the year activities to do with your class? Check out this post!
5 Fun End of The Year Activities for Upper Elementary
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