Valentine’s Day activities in the classroom bring meaningful connections, love, and engaging learning experiences for students. It is the perfect opportunity to teach students social and emotional learning (SEL) skills such as gratitude, self-love, respect, and more. You can also use this as an opportunity to teach students about the history of the love-filled holiday. Whether you’re teaching SEL skills or history, there are many ways you can implement fun and academic learning moments with your students across all subjects and grades.

With Nearpod, you can explore premade Valentine’s Day activities and lessons fit for your classroom. Download SEL activities to teach strategies like mantras and growth mindset, plus other freebies to use with your students!

New to Nearpod? Teachers can sign up for a free Nearpod account below to access these resources, interactive activities, and engaging lessons. Administrators can schedule a call with an expert to unlock the full power of Nearpod for schools and districts.

Fun Valentine’s Day activities for students in your classroom

1. Practice self-love and kindness through social and emotional learning

Nearpod’s social and emotional learning activities are easy to implement into your class routines all year, especially on Valentine’s Day. Integrate social and emotional learning activities to practice skills like positive interactions, gratitude, and reflective moments into daily learning to help create safe, inclusive, and effective classroom environments. When SEL practices are thoughtfully selected and used authentically, they have greater power to be effective. Download these Valentine’s Day activities for schools to use on February 14th or year-round.

Here are classroom activities you can use:

• Use the How to Spread Kindness activity for grades K-2 to draw or write one way they can spread kindness. Encourage random acts of kindness to spread positivity throughout the day.
• Watch the Mantras Just a Minute video for grades 3-8 to teach students how to be confident.
• Practice self-love with an Art Therapy Activity video for grades 6-8.
• Watch Abby Caddaby’s Sesame Street video for grades K-2 to learn how to self-hug.
• Use this virtual reality (VR) lesson for grades 6-8 to teach students self-assertion and practice techniques for advocating for themselves.

2. Write to someone special using Time to Climb Valentine’s Day cards

We’ve created printable Valentine’s cards with characters from students’ favorite educational game, Time to Climb! Share them with your students or your colleagues, or give them to students to share with each other (and they’re also cute in black and white!). You can print them out, share them digitally, or post them on social media! Students can also create colorful displays of their own by designing cards or crafting unique artwork for a class or school-wide showcase.

3. Play educational games with the Time to Climb Valentine’s Day Theme

Use gamified assessment tools, like Time to Climb, for Valentine’s Day games and activities for students. Every February, we release a seasonal Valentine’s Day classroom game theme with a lovely new background, animation, and music. Students love choosing new themes and characters whenever they play! Build community, excitement, and healthy competition in your classroom by making Time to Climb a routine in your classroom for reviews, bell ringers, and exit tickets.

4. Teach about the history of Valentine’s Day

Valentine’s Day has special traditions we practice every year to celebrate love. But why does this holiday exist, and what does Cupid have to do with it? Give students the background and history of this holiday with our lessons.

In this Valentine’s Day lesson, students learn about the origins of the holiday and how it is celebrated in the United States. They also learn about Valentine’s Day symbols. Click here to download the lesson for Grades K-2 and Grades 3-5.

5. Teach core subjects with a Valentine’s Day twist

Using Valentine’s Day lessons shouldn’t limit you from your day-to-day instruction. With Nearpod’s lessons, you can still teach about your common core subjects such as math, science, English language arts, and social studies. Incorporate candy heart activities or conversation hearts into lessons by using them for writing prompts, math activities, or fun team challenges.

Use these lessons:

• Multiplication – Valentine’s Edition: In this lesson for grade 3, students will use arrays, repeated addition, skip counting, and equal groups to solve multiplication word problems with a heart-shaped theme for celebrating Valentine’s Day.
• Romeo and Juliet: In this Crash Course Literature video for grades 8-12, students learn about Romeo and Juliet, including the Aristotelian definition of tragedy and Shakespeare’s decision to set the play in Italy. They also learn and identify iambic pentameter. (Mature references)
• How Do I Love Thee?: In this lesson for grades 9-10, students learn about Elizabeth Barrett Browning’s poem “How Do I Love Thee?” They make connections with the text in order to identify key details and understand the text more deeply.
• The Ladybug Love-In: In this video from Deep Look for grades 4-8, students learn about the huge gatherings of ladybugs where they do more than hibernate, and it’s their best chance to find a mate.
• An Introduction to Valentine’s Day: In this EL Content Companion lesson for grades 3-5, students use scaffolds to learn about Valentine’s Day. The lesson contains language, social-emotional learning, and content objectives, along with targeted vocabulary instruction.
• Multiplication: Valentine’s Edition: In this lesson, students will use arrays, repeated addition, skip counting, and equal groups to solve multiplication word problems. The lesson has a Valentine’s Day theme.

Start using these Valentine’s Day activities for school

Valentine’s Day is the perfect opportunity to inspire creativity and kindness in your classroom. We hope you found these Valentine’s Day ideas for schools helpful! Highlight your class’s efforts by decorating bulletin boards with their work or messages of love and appreciation. We’re so excited to see you use these activities and resources in your classroom to celebrate with your students. You can access these activities and lessons through a Nearpod account.

New to Nearpod? Teachers can sign up for a free Nearpod account below to access these resources, interactive activities, and engaging lessons. Administrators can schedule a call with an expert to unlock the full power of Nearpod for schools and districts.

Carol Chinea

Carol Chinea is a Marketing Associate at Nearpod.