Learn more about the presidents and President’s Day with these activities for middle schoolers.
Tip your stovepipe hat to President Abraham’s humble beginnings with this edible log cabin. This home can be fashioned from pretzel sticks or rods and peanut butter to hold it all together.
The plush toy we affectionately call a teddy bear today was named after a famous incident involving President Theodore ‘Teddy’ Roosevelt, who prevented the untimely death of a bear cub while on a hunting expedition. Making your own lovable stuffed animal is easier that you think.
3. Make a Model Mount Rushmore
South Dakota’s renowned 5-story tall monument took 14 years to carve into the site that now nearly 2 million people visit annually. Hopefully your model version, using clay, won’t take quite that long.
4. President’s At-Home Escape Room
Learn about the US Presidents with this exciting at-home escape room. Solve puzzles, crack codes, and answer riddles to collect 11 different paragraphs that need to be delivered to the White House!
Pull out that old change jar and watch the kids experiment away! Find out what cleaning agents work best for getting grime off of our former presidents’ faces.
While living in the White House, the Roosevelt children earned a reputation for rowdiness! They could often be found walking, jumping, or running down hallway passages on a set of homemade stilts. Try these out for yourself!
7. Memorize the Presidents
Get the names of all 46 presidents down lickety-split with this fun rhyming book called Yo, Millard Fillmore!. Alternately, try rapping the presidents in order with this song.
These hilarious mad lib stories are a great way to practice parts of speech and learn about the presidents at the same time! Check out some for free here, or purchase a whole book of them here.
9. Washington and Lincoln Paint Stick Timelines
Use some velcro on a paint stick to attach events from Lincoln’s and Washington’s lives in order.
Challenge your middle schooler to go deeper with a unit study on one of the presidents. Encourage them to learn something relatively uncommon about a well-known president, or research a lesser-known man. Here is a unit study on Abraham Lincoln with scaffolded activities appropriate for every age.
