End of year awards are a popular way to celebrate the ending of the school year. It is a fun way to celebrate your students unique strengths and hard work. You can hold a low-key awards ceremony in your classroom for your students, which is simple for you and fun for them!
Holding An Awards Ceremony
Want to make your awards seem more like an award show? Roll out the red carpet; and by red carpet I mean red butcher paper that you use for bulletin boards. I love rolling out a long piece of red butcher paper down the center of my classroom. When I call a students name for the award, they walk down the carpet. Some students get really into it! Think: they use that red butcher paper as their runway. I always make sure to snap a quick photo of the student with their award on the red carpet too so caretakers can see!
Types Of Awards
Need a generic list of different awards? I got you! Here is a list of ideas for common student awards ranging from creative awards to academic achievement to celebrating student achievements and more:
Character and Leadership Awards
- Leadership Award: For always being a phenomenal leader in the classroom and exemplifying leadership skills
- Perseverance Award: For not giving up when things get hard
- Positive Attitude Award: For having a positive impact with their positive attitude in the classroom
- Kindess Champion Award: For always showing kindness to everyone
- Helping Hand: For always being helpful in the classroom
Academic Awards
- Mathlete Award: For always trying your best in math
- Reading Award: For having tremendous growth in reading
- Super Scientist Award: For loving hands-on experiments and learning in science
- Writing Award: For having strong writing skills
- Enthusiastic Learner: For having a love of learning
- Future Teacher Award: For enjoying helping other students learn
Social and Classroom Contribution Awards
- Best Manners: For always having impeccable manners in school
- Class Clown Award: For having the best sense of humor
- Team Player Award: For always using teamwork in the classroom
- Friendship Award: For being a loyal and caring friend in the classroom
- Most Helpful Award: For always lending a helpful hand
Creativity and Expression Awards
- Best Artist: For always wanting to create and use your artistic talent
- Music Award: For loving music, singing, or playing an instrument
- Creative Thinker Award: For having out-of-the-box ideas
- Future Author Award: For having a vivid imagination and loving to tell stories
Fun And Unique Awards
- Noteworthy Neatness: For taking your time to have neat handwriting
- Future Inventor Award: For always loving to build and create
- Tech Wizard: For always being skilled in technology and digital tools
- Energetic Explorer: For always wanting to learn more and more
- Sunshine Award: For having a personality that lights up a room
- Improvement Award: For making great improvement in all areas this school year
Now, one award I do not recommend is the perfect attendance award. We do not want our students at school when they are sick. I understand that we want our kids at school, but let’s not push them to be there 100% of the time when they are not feeling 100%. Okay, off my soapbox now…
Out Of This World Awards For Your Students
Admit it, your students are out of this world! That is why I created space-themed end-of-year awards! There are a variety of different unique awards you could give your students. Our space-themed end of the year awards have 35 awards to choose from. They are:
- Shooting For The Stars: For setting goals and working hard to achieve them
- A Stellar Friend: For being a great friend to everyone
- A Mars-Velous Mathlete: For doing great work and trying your best in math
- A Far-Out Reader: For doing great work and trying your best in reading
- Always A Blast: For always having fun and making sure others have fun too!
- The Future Is Bright: For setting goals for the future and working hard to achieve them
- Giant Leaps: For making so much improvement this school year
- Orbiting Organization: For always being organized in the classroom
- Starry-Eyed For Sports: For being athletic and always wanting to play sports
- Artistic Astronaut: For loving art and always wanting to create
- Light Year Leader: For always being a leader in class
- Shooting Stars For Science: For having a love for science
- Planetary Perseverance: For working hard even when it’s difficult
- Ecliptic Positivity: For always being positive, no matter what
- Writing Wizard: For loving writing and writing fun stories
- A Magnitude For Manners: For always using your manners
- Most Determined In The Universe: For working hard and not giving up
- Speller of the Solar System: For working hard on spelling and sounding out words
- Math Fact Master Of The Milky Way: For knowing all your math facts
- Reliable Rover: For always being reliable and helpful
- Amazing Attitude Astronaut: For always having a great attitude
- Satellite School Citizen: For being a great citizen in our school
- Heartfelt Explorer: For having a caring heart
- Ray Of Sunshine: For always being a positive, happy helper
- Out Of This World Teammate: For always being a terrific teammate
- Stellar At Sharing: For sharing with everyone
- Starlight Friend: For always being a terrific friend
- Giggles Of The Galaxy: For always laughing
- Earth Caretaker: For always cleaning up and taking care of our planet
- Tech Wizard: For always knowing how to help with tech
- Kind Astronaut: For always being compassionate and kind
- Out Of This World Innovator: For always thinking and being curious
- Growth Mindset In The Galaxy: For having a growth mindset
- Comedian Of The Cosmos: For making everyone laugh
- Out Of The World Work: For always giving 100% on their work
A Fresh Approach To Student Awards
If student awards are not your thing, that’s fine too! Here is a simple idea to celebrate your students, but your students have more of a part. As a side note, I used to do student awards and this activity. This activity does not take much time to prep, which is an added bonus!
In a word document, type your students names one per page at the top. Then, leave each page on their desks. Make sure each student has a pencil. Your students will start at their desk, walk desk to desk, and write a positive note on each student’s paper. Positive affirmations are the perfect award in my book. Students love reading what other students wrote to them. Make sure you write things too and have your own page for students to write on! I still have all of mine from past school years!
What Are Benefits Of Using Student Awards
I think celebrating your students at the end of the school year is essential to wrapping up the school year. What better way to celebrate your students than with awards? However, make sure to be cognizant of the type of award you use and give each student.
Here are five benefits to using awards at the end of the school year:
- Boost Student Confidence and Motivation: Recognizing students for their hard work, growth, and achievements helps build their self-esteem and encourages them to continue putting in effort.
- Celebrates Individual Strengths: Awards allow teachers to highlight each student’s unique talents, whether it’s academic, creative, social, or leadership-related, making every child feel valued.
- Encourages A Positive Classroom Culture: Celebrating student successes creates an encouraging environment where students cheer each other on and recognize each other’s accomplishments.
- Creates Lasting Memories: End of year awards are a special way to wrap up the school year, giving students a memorable keepsake that reflects their growth.
- Reinforces Important Character Traits: Awards can recognize qualities like kindness, perseverance, teamwork, and responsibility.
Should I Use Student Awards?
I understand you may have concerns to hold a student award ceremony in your classroom. Here are some common worries when having student awards:
- Not having enough time to do an awards ceremony: The last few days of school are so busy with field day, school assemblies, yearbook signing, and so much. However, this does not have to be complicated! My student awards ceremonies typically last at max thirty minutes.
- Use pre-made templates: No need to recreate the wheel! Our awards make it even easier by having a page where you can input student names, the date, and your name and they will auto-populate right into the award certificates! Then, you can just print them! This will save you so much time when preparing your certificates.
- Combine awards with another end-of-year activity like a class slideshow, memory book signing, or yearbook signing
- What if students feel left out? They won’t! Make sure every student receives an awards tailored to their strengths. Don’t just focus on academics- focus on the whole child. Make sure to include character-based and fun awards like “Most Encouraging Friend” and “Most Creative Thinker”.
To make student awards more special, think of the following:
- Let students nominate each other for certain awards
- Add a personal note explaining why the award is meaningful and meant just for them
- When giving each student their award, explain why this student got their award
Final Thoughts
End of year student awards are a great way to celebrate your students’ achievements, both big and small. Whether you are recognizing academic excellence, character traits, or creative talents, these awards will leave a lasting impact! My own second grader still has his past awards hanging up in his bedroom!
Want to use our space-themed awards?
Click here to purchase on TPT.
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