Strategies for End of Year Review in Kindergarten
As the school year winds down, there's one item that's sure to be on your weekly lesson plans: review. You may feel overwhelmed by reviewing the skills learned throughout the year in just a few weeks. Let's ditch the stress! These end of year review strategies will help you seamlessly incorporate review and fun into your day.
Morning Work and Early Finishers
Some of the best times of day to incorporate end-of-year review are during your morning work time and early finisher time. These are two times of day that you can easily squeeze in review without making changes to your classroom schedule.
Morning work and early finisher time are perfect for reviewing because you don't have to explicitly teach any new skills. Simply go over the directions with students and give them time to practice material they have previously learned.
When students work independently, you can differentiate to meet students' needs and meet students where they are. If you have students who need more support on certain skills, you can work with them 1:1 or in a group while other students work independently.
One of my favorite review activities for morning work and early finisher activities is the Kindergarten Summer Packet. This resource reviews the essential literacy and math skills students learned this year. It has over 100 print-and-go activities, covering topics like CVC words, writing, addition, shapes, and more.
If your students need an extra challenge, give them the First Grade Summer Packet to push their skills even further. You can also send these packets home during the summer, so students can keep their skills fresh.
Calendar Time
Calendar time isn't just useful for saying the date and determining the weather. It's also an awesome opportunity to sneak in a little review. Some of the ways you can add a review to your calendar time are to:
- Count the days of school
- Count the number of days until the next student's birthday or school event
- Show the number of the day on a 100s chart or by writing it on a whiteboard
- Model the number of the day with straws or base ten blocks
- Choose a number and count on to 100
- Sing the ABC's song
- Practice rhyming words by saying a word and having students recite rhyming words (can use CVC or CVCe words)
- Write word family words on whiteboards (can use CVC or CVCe words)
- Play a sight word review game
- Dance and sing to an educational brain break or video
Mini-Lessons
At the end of the year, you may want to reteach and review concepts more in-depth, but you don't have time to devote an entire math or literacy lesson to the concept. A great way to reteach and review is by using mini-lessons.
Mini lessons allow you to focus on one skill or concept, making them effective for end-of-year review. Because they are only about 10-15 minutes long, they help your students stay on task.
Following the mini-lesson, have students engage in hands-on practice so they can apply their learning. Here are a couple of ways to incorporate hands-on practice after your mini-lesson.
End of Year Crafts
What better way to review all that students have learned this year than to make an end of year learning craft!?
This set of end of year crafts for kindergarten includes 4 crafts – a math review craft, a reading review craft, and two writing reflection crafts.
With these easy-to-assemble crafts, your students will be able to reflect on the math skills they've learned this year (think: shapes, counting, teen numbers, addition, and subtraction) and the literacy skills they've learned too (think: the alphabet, CVC words, CVCe words, rhyming words, and digraphs). They'll also be able to write about their favorite memory and what they've learned this year.
Ready to add a little craft time to your end of year review plans? Grab your set of end of year learning crafts for kindergarten!
Free End of Year Activities
If you're looking to make review fun the last few days of school, these free summer-themed math and literacy activities have got you covered!
Your students will enjoy spinning spinners, rolling dice, and using manipulatives as they review skills like teen numbers, numbers to 100, beginning blends, and CVCe words.
Ready to make review a little more exciting? Grab your set of free end of year activities below!
I hope these ideas for end of year review leave you feeling more equipped to cover key skills with your students heading into the last few weeks of school.
