33 Open House Classroom Ideas for Meet the Teacher Night
Are you looking for some open house classroom ideas? If so you’re in the right place. Whether you have an open house night before school or a parent night during the school year I’ve gathered some ideas for you to help make it go smoothly and have fun too!
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Open House Classroom Ideas
An open house before school starts is the perfect opportunity to make a great first impression with your students and their families. There are ways that you can organize it to make it a stress-free event for everyone.
Check out the best ideas to pull off your meet the teacher night in style and make it a fun event! At the end I’ve included more ideas for an open house during the school year too.
1 | Open House Stations
Creating stations spread throughout the room will give students and their families something to do and avoid a line of parents waiting to talk to you at the same time. Create a simple checklist or a bingo sheet to lead families throughout the classroom. Here are some station ideas:
- Sign-in Sheet so you know who dropped in
- School Supply Drop Off
- Morning Routine Checklist
- Class Scavenger Hunt
- Fill out Parent Forms
- Meet the Teacher
- A fun activity like a STEM challenge or an estimation jar!
I’ll show you all of these station ideas and more in this post
2 | Open House Checklist
To help the stations go smoothly and ensure that none are missed why not create an open house station checklist.
3 | Open House Bingo Sheet
Another idea instead of a checklist is to create an open house bingo sheet. Families can complete the sheet in any order that they wish. This is helpful to avoid bottlenecks when there are already several families at one station.
4 | Meet the Teacher Sheets
Here’s how to make a great impression the first time you meet parents! Create personal meet the teacher sheets to hand out at your open house. You can find this editable meet the teacher template on Etsy here. Here’s what to include on these sheets:
- A note of welcome
- Your photo
- A little bit of information about you
- Some of your favorite things
- Your contact information and the best times to contact you.
5 | Collect Important Information
Your open house is the perfect time to collect information from parents that will help your year run smoother. Create a form for parents to fill out and return to you at the end of the night or to send back to school. Here are some ideas of the information to collect:
- Parent contact information including email address and phone number and best times to be contacted
- Volunteer sign-up sheets
- Student transportation plan
- Allergy information
- Any additional Information that they want to share about their child
6 | School Supply Organization
If you’re collecting school supplies during your open house an easy way to keep it all organized is to use bins with labels to show where the supplies go. This will save you so much time of sorting all the supplies later.
7 | Find Your Seat
Before your open house set up student desks with their name tags, a welcome letter, a meet the teacher sheet and even a small gift. Have students find where they will be sitting during the parent night.
8 | Take Home Folders
Prepare take home folders for your families. These can include school information and helpful resources that they can keep at home as well as forms that you would like them to fill out and return to school. Many teachers like to use these folders through the school year to keep classroom resources organized.
9 | Scavenger Hunt
Create a scavenger hunt for your prospective students and their parents. During the fun scavenger hunt families can hunt for the most informant places in the classroom. If you have teacher assistants include them in the hunt as well. This will help students feel confident to start off the school year!
10 | Meet Families Individually
Your open house is a great time to get to meet and talk with families individually. A great idea to ensure that you get a little one on one with everyone is to add meet the teacher to your checklist!
11 | Back to School Handbook
Create a handbook for your elementary classroom to hand out to parents during your open house. You can create a flipbook with different size sheets so parents can see what’s inside. Here are some ideas to include in your handbook:
- Meet the Teacher Information
- Welcome Letter
- Classroom Rules
- Homework Policy
- Daily Schedule
- Behavior Management
- Contact Information
- Special Area Teacher Information
- School Information and Rules
12 | Open House Slide Show Welcome Slide
Create a welcome to the open house slide that tells families a little bit about yourself and instructions for the night. I love the idea of adding a photo of yourself at the age you teach. Students would get a kick out of this too!
13 | Practice Morning Routines
Have students and families practice the morning routine in the classroom. Students can see how where they will put their belongings, wash their hands and what they can do as they are waiting for class to start. This will help lessen the first day jitters and help the first day of school go so much smoother for everyone!
14 | Student Reward for Coming
Give students a small reward for showing up at the open house. Some ideas are a free homework pass, a ticket to eat lunch with a friend, an extra free time pass or a chance to draw a small prize from the reward jar. Let’s check out some more open house classroom ideas for gifts below.
15 | Raffle Tickets
You can have students sign up for a raffle as a thank you for stopping by the open house with their family! Here are some ideas for what the raffle prize can be:
- Special school supplies like fun pencils or cute erasers.
- A free homework pass
- A yummy treat like candy or popcorn.
- A pass for 20 minute of free time or an extra recess
16 | Thank You Note
Provide a thank you note for families to thank them for stopping by the open house.
17 | Small Treat for Students to Take Home
A fun way to get students excited about the new school year is to provide them with a small treat and a note from you. One idea is to provide a bag of popcorn with a note that says, “Let’s get poppin’ and make this an awesome school year.”
If you like this idea you can find this printable bag tag here. You just need to add the popcorn!
18 | Small Gift to Stay at School
An alternative to providing a small treat for students to take home is to provide a little gift that will stay at school and students will use during the school year. If you have a classroom theme its’ fun to find a gift that matches your theme. Some ideas are pens, pencils, a new book or cute erasers.
A fun idea is to provide a multicolor pen like these and then you can attach this cute printable gift tag that reads, “Let’s start this year off write!”
19 | Open House Printable Bundle
An easy way to make your open house go smoother is to get a printable bundle that has everything you need to pull off a successful meet the teacher night. I love this bundle because it is stylish and includes everything you need. Here’s what is included:
- Various welcome, meet the teacher and open house forms
- All about your child survey
- Guardian contact info sheets
- Lend a helping hand volunteer sign up
- Transportation list
- Classroom supply list
- “Daily Schedule” Display/Flyer (multiple)
- Photography permission form
- Chaperone list for parties + fieldtrips
- Parent-teacher conferences sign-up sheets
- Flipbook with 6 flaps to fill with info about your classroom
- Editable Google slides and PowerPoint
- Cute flags for photo shoots
- Treat/Goodie bag tags
- Contact Cards
- Welcome signs and banners
- Supply donation tags
- Amazon wishlist and so much more!
Fun Ideas for Your Open House
These next few ideas are optional but are a great way to build a connection with your students and their families. Let’s check out some open house classroom ideas to add a little fun to your back to school night.
20 | Back to School Night Photo Booth
Provide a Polaroid camera and create a spot in the classroom as the photo backdrop. Students and parents can take pictures to remember the moment.
Create a bulletin board with a string and clothespins and encourage families to hang photos that they took. This will help you build that sense of classroom community right from the start!
21 | Photo Props for Back to School Night
To add a little extra to your photos session you can provide fun photo props. Here’s a cute photobooth set that you can order on Amazon. It comes with 41 cute props that are perfect for back to school!
22 | Positive Notes from Parents
During your open house provide parents with blank sticky notes. On the notes they can write something they are proud of about their child or just a happy note! You can read these notes on the first day of school with your students and watch them beam from ear to tear!
Fun Open House Station Ideas
If you’re looking for some creative open house classroom ideas for your stations, then read on. I’ll show you some fun ideas beyond the basic back to school stations below.
23 | STEM Challenge Station
Here’s a fun idea! Add a STEM challenge station. All you need is a timer and a basket full of red solo cups.
Challenge families to see what type of structure they can build in 2 minutes. This is a great way to get parents involved.
24 | Estimation Jar Challenge
Have students practice math estimation skills and guess how may pom poms or M&Ms are in a jar. They’ll write down their guess and you can reveal the winner with a small prize on the first day of school!
25 | Welcome Post Card
Here’s a fun idea to make your students feel welcomed for the new school year. Before school starts send them a welcome post card with a personalized note.
You can let them know how excited you are to have them in your class this year and that it’s going to be a great year!
Creative Supply Donation Ideas
Your open house is a great time to ask for additional supplies that your classroom needs. Check out some creative ways to ask for supply donations from parents below.
26 | Pick a Light Bulb Donation Display
Here’s a creative idea to ask for parent donations. Write the items that the class needs on paper light bulbs. Then attach them to popsicle sticks. Invite parents to pick a light bulb if they would like to make a class donation!
27 | Grab a Pencil Donation Display
Here’s another cute donation display idea. Put the class needs on paper pencils. Then attach the pencils to a display with clothespins. If parents would like to donate then can choose a pencil from your display.
28 | White Board Wish List Idea
Here’s a great idea to copy. Near the door as parents are leaving create a display of notecards with supplies that the class needs. Put a note that says thanks for stopping by and invite families to take a note card if they would like to donate to your class.
29 | Classroom Wishlist
Create an amazon classroom wish list and then give parents the QR code that they can scan and purchase items from your list. Here’s where you can download this free editable template to create your own Wishlist. It also includes a quick how to video to show you how to set it up if you’ve never done it before.
For Open Houses During the School Year
If you have an open house that is after school has started, you can use the idea above and also, I’ve gathered more ideas for you.
30 | Guess Who
Have students complete a writing activity titled, can you guess who I am? Have them answer several questions about some of their favorite things and activities. Then when the sheets are flipped open it will have the student’s name, picture or self portraits!
During the open house have parents read these and see if they can guess which one their child made! Kids and parents both love this activity.
31 | Display Student Work
Display some of your student’s best work to give them an opportunity to show it off to their parents.
32 | Student Tour Guides
Have students be the tour guides for open house and lead their parents through the classroom. Provide students with a checklist so they know what to share with their parents as they are giving them a tour of the room.
33 | Compliment Station
This fun station provides an opportunity for parents to leave a compliment for the class and leave it in a bucket. Then you will read the compliment to the class the next day during school!
I hope you found some fun open house classroom ideas to try this year. Feel free to save your favorite classroom theme ideas to your Pinterest boards just click on the P on the picture.
If you like this post here are some more to check out-
55 Best Classroom Setup Ideas for Back to School
31 Back to School and Welcome Classroom Door Ideas
The Best Classroom Themes for a Fun School Year