Engaging kids with these community-building activities for the first week of school will lead to a positive classroom environment. Help children learn and practice social skills and develop friendships.
Community Building Activities You NEED for the First Week of School
To be successful in school, students must have the opportunity to get to know each other, work together, and learn how to depend on each other. You will want to provide them ample opportunity to learn these skills through community-building activities.
Having community-building activities for the first week of school is a great way to bring the students in your classroom together and involve everyone in positive student learning opportunities. This also creates a sense of belonging. Try these ideas to make your new learners feel welcome and empowered!
Table of Contents
- Community Building Activities You NEED for the First Week of School
- Community Building SEL Resource
- More Back to School Ideas
- Community Building Resources
Ice Breakers as Community Building Activities
Icebreaker games are sometimes ineffective in helping students learn about each other at the start of the school year. But these ideas are fun and easy for anyone, even the shyest student, to participate no matter the mood.
Encourage a positive classroom climate and get to know each other with these icebreaker activities.
- Morning Meetings: A daily morning meeting routine is essential for breaking the ice! It will unite your students in a collaborative discussion where everyone feels equal and their thoughts are valued.
- Sorting into Groups: Have peers sort themselves into groups based on things they may have in common or different topics. For instance, ask students to find students whose names start with the same letter as theirs, whose birthdays are in the same month, whose eye color is the same as theirs, or what color shirt they’re wearing. Ask questions that are non-threatening, not discriminating, and fast and easy for students to answer and find similar companions.
- This or That: Similar to the activity above, students move from one side of the room to the other. Give classmates two choices, such as “Pizza or Macaroni and Cheese?” and let them sort themselves into the designated side based on their preferences.
Lessons and Templates that Make Good Community Building Activities
One way to build a positive classroom community is to teach the necessary social-emotional development skills. Try some of these lessons and printables. You will easily be able to guide the students. They will adopt attitudes and behaviors that will foster a positive learning community in your classroom.
- Friend Wanted: This brilliant idea for teaching students about friendship and learning more about each other is “Friend Wanted Ads.” These ads encourage students to open their minds to friendship possibilities with other students in the room. Essential life skills are taught about how to be a good friend.
- THINK: Teach children this handy acronym for remembering how to speak kindly to each other. “Think” before you speak. T= Is it true? H = Is it helpful? I = Is it inspiring? N = Is it necessary? K = Is it kind?
- Warm Fuzzy Jar: Have a class meeting discussing the character traits needed to create a positive community in the classroom. Then, try this technique: Pass out fuzzy balls to children who show kindness, cooperativeness, or acceptance. They can place the fuzzy balls into a jar. When the jar is full, the whole class can celebrate!
- Expressing Emotions: Help children learn to identify and express their emotions appropriately through engaging hands-on activities. Try the Express Yourself board game as a fun alternative!
Games as Community Building Activities
Try out some of these fun participation games with your students! They will not even realize they are learning to cooperate, communicate, and socialize.
- Puzzles: Sometimes, a simple puzzle is all it takes. Puzzles are an easy group task you can use as a team effort. Sort students into small groups and give each group a puzzle to complete. The first team to complete their puzzle gets a prize or bragging rights. Either way, it’s a simple and easy activity that will get them working together.
- Ball Toss Name Game: Students sit in a circle and take turns tossing a large softball. As they toss the ball, they say the name of the person who will catch it. Play proceeds until the children’s names are well-known.
- More Ideas: If this isn’t enough, here are many more ideas and activities to build community.
Community Building Activities: STEM
Add in a little Science, Technology, Engineering, or Math with these fun activities. They’ll encourage students to use their skills in those subjects to solve a problem together.
- Building a Tower or Bridge: There are so many variations of this activity, and all of them are fun. Provide students with materials to build a tower or bridge, set the rules for constructing the design, and watch them collaborate to meet a common goal. Inexpensive materials, such as popsicle sticks, toothpicks, straws, gumdrops, marshmallows, rubber bands, and spaghetti noodles, are popular items to provide.
- Making Friends with Math: This rock, paper, scissors style game and printable activity is perfect for children to practice Math skills as well as get to know each other.
Community Building Activities: Books
Here are a few favorite books that help teachers build strong classroom community. By reading these books aloud to your class, you can point out themes of friendship, gratitude, cooperation, inclusion, and positive mindsets.
- Read How Full is Your Bucket? for Kids by Tom Rath to help students recognize when their friends’ “buckets” are empty.
- Roxaboxen is a timeless tale that celebrates community. It was written by Alice McLerran and illustrated by Barbara Cooney.
- Students will enjoy the story of inclusion, respect, and individuality in The Invisible Boy by Trudy Ludwig.
Try any of these community-building activities for the first days or weeks back to school, and watch the students in your classroom grow and learn in a positive and encouraging environment.
Community Building SEL Resource
This back to school social emotional learning resource is the perfect companion to your start of school lesson plans. It includes mini-lesson ideas and activities for kindergarten, first, and second grades that build classroom connections, encourage engagement, and teach children vital social and emotional skills at the beginning of the school year!
The SEL back to school resource and activities will support kids as they learn to be positive members of the classroom community, develop self-awareness, build new relationships, and act with kindness and empathy.
Free Week of Morning Meeting
Try social-emotional morning meetings in your classroom with this FREE week-long resource! It includes editable PowerPoint and PDF slides, printable cards, and instructions on how to use them.
Click the image below to grab a copy.
More Back to School Ideas
Community Building in the Classroom
Back to School Classroom Activities
back to school read aloud activities
Community Building Resources
Strengthen your classroom community and help build socially aware, confident, and capable students with the Social Emotional Learning curriculum for K-2.
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