Exploding Kittens card game * Uno * Free play Lego ** Lego Masters (competition I run). I have over 20% of the school signed up to compete this year (school of 160) * Table Tents - I have custom made tents that fit the tables (thanks to my Mum), but a sheet works really well too * Trading Days - whenever there is a collectable going at Woolies or Coles I run a trading Tuesday so kids can get full sets * Twister - 2 mats going every lunch time * Playing Librarian - sitting in my 'reading throne' and reading a story to other kids.
** There is a TV show called Lego Masters and we run a similar competition in our library. Students are in teams of 2 and they compete against other students with Lego builds. I have a different challenge each week, one was to make hamburgers, for example, another was to build flat - like a painting, and so on. Other teachers in the school come in as guest judges. Points are collated over 3-4 weeks and a champion is announced. This happens 3-5 times throughout the year and then we have a Lego Masters - Champions event at the end of the year, where a team earns the title of school Lego champions. We even had a special edition season where staff stayed back and did a build and all the student's voted. To do this, I have 10 tubs of Lego with 2000 bricks in each, all the same ($2,000 worth - kindly donated!). I even have Lego sorters who keep all the tubs tidy It is a lot of work but it is fun, and in case you cannot tell, I am also a bit of a Lego Fan.
Flashlight Friday. I have a box of sheets and a box of $2 Bunnings torches and they come out every lunchtime on Friday. Main lights are switched off and blinds down. Everyone loves it except for two chess-loving Year 6 boys who tolerate it because they get my lantern I use for camping.
Nintendo Switch club and Dungeons and Dragons are popular in my high school library
I use to have a genre book club where students read books from a genre. Each month we would have a different genre. We then used story dice and took turns to role the dice and answer the questions - who are the characters, what is the setting etc. about the books others read they read. I encouraged the students to write the names of the books others read if they were interested.
I borrowed this idea from another fabularian, whisper Wednesday. Similar to other suggested quiet activities but achievable ish for one lunch break. Kids are permitted to leave their shoes outside and get comfy to read under mood lighting and relaxation music. It’s not quite at whisper stage yet… but getting there. I do arts/crafts Monday, Tuesday and blocks/games Wednesday, Thursday- our library can be separated into 2 zones.
My students love playing teachers using the IWB
Our kids love the card game Swipee, created by students at an Adelaide Hills primary school. Also ‘Taco Cat Goat Cheese Pizza’ and the Magnet Game
jigsaw puzzles * Connect Four * Guess Who games * colouring in and free drawing * card games * Snake and Ladder board games
I currently have Lego, drawing / colouring and quiet reading, and Lego goes OFF!
The kids in my former library loved playing with blocks - I had small plastic ones that were all just cubes and some fabulous huge foam ones. They built forts and mazes and houses - and the blocks were popular with all ages and both girls and boys. I also had simple board games that could be played in less then 30 minutes such as Tummy Ache; Slamwich; and the Grade 6 kids like ordinary playing cards. I also had Blink, a racing card game where you had to match four or five card attributes - it was brilliant. It came in a small tin. I tried chess but the pieces kept getting lost and also we never seemed to have a full set of Uno. Individual kids loved solving my set of Rubics cubes.