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| a PIRATE card art project we made turned out cute. |
I always do a Pirate Party at the end of the year. It is a fun day we look forward to all year. I’ve done different things each year but these are 15 of the most fun things I’ve come up with in 21 years of teaching. Have kids all put their name on a brown bag and add a handle to it. Put some torn red/white fabric and tie a strip on the handle. Add a pirate sticker or skull crossbones printout to the bag. Then have the kids go to 6 stations of activities you choose and bring their bag with them for all the prizes and loot they will get! All stations should take about 8-10 minutes.
CRAFT TYPE ACTIVITIES
1. Whole Group Activity – Make a Pirate Hat (Do altogether on tables – directions and printable tutorial diagram are HERE at Birthday in a Box.
The skull and crossbones printables are all over the internet. HERE is a cute one, and it is free!
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| Pirate Hats – I used black butcher paper folded like a sailor hat. Kids added their pirate names to the back and skull and crossbones I copied and they glued them to the front. |
2. Station 2 – Pirate Name (What is your pirate name?) Print out this freebie on a big poster on a table. Kids write their funny pirate names on the back of their hats with white crayon or chalk. Hats made with black butcher paper. Add a skull and crossbones free printout cutout to each hat. HERE is a freebie Find Your Pirate Name Game.
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| We’ve made black, red and white bracelets with pony beads in some of my past pirate parties. |
3. Station 3 – Get some Pirate Bling (Make Fruit Loop necklaces with gold coins or use pony beads in black, red and white) glue gun a chenille stem loop to the gold coins before the party. Or make a mustache on a stick!
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| I used black poster board for the eye patches and we taped a piece of black yarn on top and tied them in a bow around our heads. It was easy. The mustache was construction paper taped on a skewer stick. |
4. Station 4 – Get a Tatoo and an Eye Patch. (Face Paint a scar or put tatoos on arms) Put an eye patch on some string and tie it around forehead. HERE is a free printable. Get pirate tatoos at a party store or Oriental Trading. Some eye patches are HERE as well as a beard you can put on a stick.
5. Station 5 – Make a Pirate Hook Hand. Directions on how to do it using red plastic cups and tin foil are HERE. Decorate it with these doo dads HERE.
CARNIVAL ACTIVE TYPE CENTERS
6. Station 6 – Walk The Plank Obstacle Course. 2 games here. 1st is put a plank of wood between two crates and kids walk with one eye closed and hands behind back. 2nd obstacle is hop with a tennis ball (canon ball) between your knees and drop it in a bucket. Everybody gets a chance to do 1. Then watch others. Then do 2nd obstacle, then watch others.
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| For our Pirate Party all the kids dressed in black and white. |
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| Have a fun photo station where kids have pirate hand hooks, eye patches, fun hats and take pics! |
7. Station 7 and share Pirate Jokes Check out some at Enchanted Learning. and do a ring toss on water bottles. Use cut out black and red plastic plates (just cut the outside of the plate to make ring toss rings). Read a joke, throw a ring.
example: What’s orange and sounds like a parrot?
(A carrot!)
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| Some of the girls really dressed up for the Pirate Party! Super Cute! |
8. Station 8. Pictures & Throw a sponge at the pirate. Take turns getting behind the cut out pirate face. Get an assortment of spongy balls and cut out some square sponges from the dollar store. Take turns seeing if you can hit the face. Take pictures at the end of each child in the pirate cut out. If it is an outside summer party on a hot day get the sponges wet.
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| They loved their pirate patches! They all wore them home on the bus ride. |
9. Station 9. Pin the Patch on the Pirate Printable is HERE. I’ve done this with 1st and 2nd graders and it is lots of fun. I just blew up a pirate coloring page and backed it with red and white striped paper and bordered it with black. HERE is a link to eye patches you can print up or just cut them out of black construction paper and have kids tape them on. Cover their eyes with red bandanas and sing “Yo Ho, Yo Ho a Pirates Life for ME!” as you spin them around.
LEARNING CENTERS (EDUCATIONAL)
10. Station 10 – Pirate Bingo Game (using sight words- good for 1st grade or end of kinder) free printable games HERE. Or HERE is another cute Bingo game.
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| Here was my Pirate Bingo we called Buccaneer Bingo. Get free copies from Kinder Gater Gals at TPT HERE. |
11. Station 11. Math Cardgame – Pirate War – get in groups of two partners. Both of you put down a card. Add up the numbers. The one with the highest sum gets both cards. Person with the most cards at the end of 10 minutes is the winner and gets a jewel to put in their sack. Check out THESE free printables. Or THESE that I used. Kids can cut them out and take them home in envelopes.
12. Station 12 – Pirate Go Fish – Use these 16 colorful pirate pictures and copy twice for each partnership. 2 kids cut out and then play go fish or concentration with the cards. The free printables I found are HERE. Also an ABC Maze Printable is HERE. or HERE is an ABC order Pirate game.
REFRESHMENT TABLE IDEAS
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| Here was my classroom Pirate Party Refreshment Table. We had 2 kinds of drinks too. I don’t know why that duct tape is there, we didn’t eat any duct tape. lol. |
13. Station 13 –Refreshments
1. Pixie Stix (pixie dust) (add little black triangular pirate flags to the top).
2. Pirate Canon Balls (cheese balls or malt balls)
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| I just got cheese balls (generic) from the market and made up a cute sign. |
3. Fish and Chips (orange goldfish crackers and potato or tortilla chips)
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| Next to this bowl is a bowl of cheese fish crackers. Get it? Fish and “chips”. lol. |
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| Here are the goldfish that went with the “Fish and Chips” Signs. I just typed them out and pasted them on red paper then on black to border it nicely. Then I added stickers or pirate pictures I got off the internet. |
4. cupcakes with pirate Cupcake Toppers HERE, or HERE.
5. Fruit Roll Ups wrapped with a pirate treasure map coloring page
6. Pirate Popcorn – use jello and make red popcorn balls, or just get some caramel corn or regular popcorn and call it “Pirate Popcorn”.
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| We had double stuffed Oreos and of course Chips Ahoy cookies. |
7. Chips Ahoy or Pirate Os (oreo cookies).
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| Here are some “skeleton” brownies I made at Halloween that would also be great for a Pirate Party. The heads are candy melt discs, the bodies are yogurt covered pretzels. I used icing for arms and legs and faces. |
8. Skeleton Brownies.
14. Take Home Gift Ideas
1. Goodie Bags with pirate items inside. I had jewels from the dollar store, rings, pirate bookmarks, chocolate coins, lollypops, and cute little chocolate pirates wrapped in gold foil with skulls and crossbones.
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| Aren’t these the CUTEST Chocolate Pirates wrapped in foil? A parent bought a whole class set of them. They went into my goodie bag. Another parent bought each of the kids 2 gold chocolate coins. Those went in too. In years past the kids have gotten pirate black balloons and pirate erasers. |
2. ABC maze HERE and wrap it around a fruit roll up.
3. Lollypops or Tootsie Rolls taped to a small Pirate wordsearch HERE.
4. Pirate Playdough (make your own in purple or black) I have a recipe for Koolaid Playdough HERE on my blog. Put them in mini ziplock baggies.
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| Land Lubbers Licorice. haha. |
5. Pirate Superballs and Balloons. I bought mine from Oriental Trading HERE. They are tiny but fun to play with. Wrap them together in a bag.
6. Landlubber Licorice – This is cute in a jar. The above one was for a different party but you could put pirate skull and crossbones on the jars. Make an assortment of “Pirate Loot” and put them in bags like this tied with black yarn.
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| I also had pirate superballs I had ordered from Oriental Trading a few years ago. They have lasted through several years of classroom parties. |
PARTY ROTATIONS
I try to have 6 really good PARTY ROTATIONS (centers) and kids spend 10 minutes at each one. They go around in groups of 4 so the games can be played multiple times (like Bingo). I try to do 2 crafty type activities, 2 active play activities, and 2 learning games (educational).
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| For a home party you could fill cookie jars with candy or gumballs and let the kids do their own goodie bags. |
If I do a bingo I try to have the words along with the pictures so they are reading. The first activity is making the hat and bag. They take the bag around with them. At each center is a fun token or giveaway (pixie stix, rings, bubbles, bead necklace etc.) so they have an assortment of take home prizes. Some are just prizes if they win.
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| I’ve used this party bucket for prizes, ice and cans of sodas and all sorts of things. Just add vinyl lettering to a red bucket from the craft store and then for each party add a decal, sticker or printable coloring page to the top on a theme for the party. Skull and crossbones work perfectly. I do this with small buckets to hold silverware, napkins, and craft supplies at the rotations too. |
The whole party should last about 75 minutes. Have fun Mateys! Argggg! And have fun Walking the Plank!
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| Pirate Party Fun! |
