Looking for fun and engaging St. Patrick’s Day activities for 1st grade? A Leprechaun Theme Day is the perfect way to bring excitement and learning into your classroom in March! Students will work in teams to complete hands-on St. Patrick’s Day stations, review math and literacy skills, and even build a leprechaun trap to catch a mischievous leprechaun. These low prep St. Patrick’s Day activities will make learning magical for your students!
In this post, you’ll find tons of ideas for planning your own classroom Leprechaun theme Day and some fun St. Patrick’s Day activities for first grade, students! Plus, find some FREE St. Patrick’s Day Writing prompts and crafts at the end of the post!
Read more about some of our other favorite Theme Days here!
About Leprechaun Day in First Grade
In first grade, March always begins to feel a little stir crazy! The weather is hit or miss, but those first few days of sunshine can definitely bring extra excitement! We’re also inching closer to Spring break. With this in mind, I love to shake things up and bring some magic and fun to our classroom for St. Patrick’s Day! Planning a Leprechaun Day with easy and low prep St. Patrick’s day activities is perfect!
On St. Patrick’s Day (or the Friday before!) we have Leprechaun Day! We spend the day reading leprechaun books, completing a writing activity, working in Leprechaun Stations, and making a St. Patrick’s Day craft!
St. Patrick’s Day Activities: Leprechaun Stations
I begin the day by displaying this slide on our smart board. I tell students we have a special message! A tricky leprechaun is causing mischief in our classroom! Our job is to work together in teams to complete 8 different challenge activities. By completing all the activities, we can catch the leprechaun before he gets away with the pot of gold!
Leprechaun Stations and St. Patrick’s Day Activities
Our very favorite part of the day is working in teams to complete the Leprechaun Station St. Patrick’s Day activities! There are 8 different stations so it takes up most of the day! I also included editable station signs and slides so you can change them up to work best in your classroom. 🙂
I put students in teams of 2 or 3 and give each student a Pot of Gold Station card so that they can track which activities they have visited. As they complete a station activity, they can add a sticker to their chart! The kids absolutely LOVE these charts. They get so excited to add the stickers and I love that they can take them home and share with their families about all the St. Patrick’s Day activities we did.
Station 1: Balance the Rainbow
In this fun math St. Patrick’s day activity, students will work together to match up the rainbow pieces to make a balanced equation.
Two Ways to Play:
Memory Style: Turn the cards face down in rows. Students will take turns turning over two cards to see if it’s a match.If they find a match, they can keep the cards and each player will record the equation on their recording page.If it is not a match, turn the cards back over and continue playing.The player with the most matches is the winner.
Free Find: All players work together to match up the cards. Once all matches are found, record the equations on the recording sheet.
Station 2: My Leprechaun Friend Writing
In this St. Patrick’s Day station, students practice writing skills! Students imagine they met a leprechaun friend while searching for the pot of gold. They write about what their friend likes and doesn’t like, his favorite things, and silly tricks he’s played!
Station 3: Lucky Roll and Cover
In this fun St. Patrick’s day math review game, students roll two dice. They can add or subtract the numbers and cover the sum or difference. The first player to cover all the numbers is the winner!
Station 4: Shamrock Sort Nouns and Verbs
This Shamrock Noun and Verb Sort is a fun way for 1st graders to practice sorting words while strengthening their grammar skills! Students will cut out the shamrock words and glue them under the correct headers—nouns or verbs. As a bonus challenge, they can use the words to create their own leprechaun-themed sentences on the back.
Station 5: R Controlled Pot of Gold
Get your students moving and practicing phonics with this R-Controlled Pot of Gold activity! This station includes two engaging options, so you can choose what works best for your classroom.
With the Gold Coin Hunt, students will search the room for gold coins labeled with R-controlled words and record them under the correct header. If you prefer a no-prep option, the Cut and Paste Sort lets students sort R-controlled pictures or words and glue them in the right category.
Station 6: Lucky Charm Graphing
This is always a favorite out of all of our St. Patrick’s Day activities! Students will practice graphing using lucky charms!
For this activity, I like to fill individual zip lock bags with the charms. I only make enough for each student in the group to have their own bag. I also like to count and make sure there aren’t more than 10 of one type of marshmallow so the data will fit in the bar graph.
Students will sort their charms and count to see how many of each they have. They will then represent the data in the tally chart and bar graph.
Station 7: Build a Leprechaun Trap
For this activity, I wanted to keep it flexible so you can decide how much prep works best for you. You can keep it simple by providing just play-doh and pipe cleaners and letting students use their creativity to design a leprechaun trap. Or, if you’d like to add more variety, you can include additional materials for students to build with.
How to Set Up This Station:
– Low-Prep Option: Simply provide play-doh and pipe cleaners. Let students use these materials to construct a creative leprechaun trap.
– Expanded Option: Offer a variety of craft supplies and building materials so students can design and construct a more detailed trap.
Optional Materials You Can Add:
- Play-doh
- Pipe cleaners
- Green plastic cups
- Small boxes (shoe boxes, tissue boxes, etc.)
- Paper Towel Rolls
- Gold Coins
- Construction paper
- Popsicle sticks
- String or yarn
- Tape or glue
Station 8: Leprechaun Word Search
My students LOVE word searches. They work together with their team to find all of the St. Patrick’s Day words. If they don’t find all of the words before time is up, they can save their papers and I give them more time at the end of the day!
St. Patrick’s Day Activities Writing Prompts
Along with our stations, I also like to do some St. Patrick’s Day writing with my students. In my Leprechaun Theme Day activity pack, you can choose from a variety of writing St. Patrick’s Day activities such as:
- How to Catch a Leprechaun
- My Lucky Day
- If I found a Pot of Gold
- Lucky List
- Leprechaun Wanted
Acrostic Rainbow Craft for March
One of my favorite crafts we do in 1st grade are Acrostic Rainbows! Students brainstorm a word or phrase for each letter in their name that describes them! They write the words on rainbow strips and glue them to a name cloud. I LOVE hanging these on the windows of our classroom! They look so beautiful and remind us that spring is near!
I also included an option for Adjective Rainbows which are a little easier for brainstorming and perfect review if you’re working on adjectives! 🙂
Want to grab some St. Patrick’s Day Writing Freebies?! Check out these No Prep Crafts!
They’re perfect to go along with your Leprechaun Day St. Patrick’s Day activities, or to use all month long! Find them here!
I hope this post gave you some ideas for planning a Leprechaun Day in your 1st grade classroom! You can find all of the St. Patrick’s Day activities mentioned in this post here:
Leprechaun Station Day: St. Patrick’s Day Activities for 1st Grade
