Over the years I have cultivated a few Halloween reading activities that are treasures that I really enjoy using in my upper elementary classroom each year when Halloween comes around. I love celebrating Halloween in my classroom with my fifth-grade students. Halloween packs a fun punch toward the end of October and really spices up the enjoyment level in the classroom. Check out these Halloween reading activities for upper elementary classrooms.
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Halloween Reading Activities for Upper Elementary Students
Halloween is a great time to change up our reading routines and activities and do something a little different and more lively.
Really Creepy Stuff
FYI: I only endorse things that I've personally used or have come highly recommended from my teacher friends and family and think they may be helpful to you. If you buy anything mentioned using my Amazon referral links, I may get a small commission at no extra cost to you.
Lindsay Flood has some great seasonal/holiday reading articles for sale on Teachers Pay Teachers that are really fun and engaging for fifth grade students on up to eighth grade students. The Halloween informational text passages with graphic organizers are called Really Creepy Stuff. I have used these over the years and have found the articles are and interesting dive into different topics related to Halloween.
Really Creepy Stuff has articles on above ground tombs in Louisiana called Cities of the Dead. Other articles include are on topics such as spiders, vampire bats, our blood, and pumpkins. These articles cover topics and are written in a fun, yet informative manner. It is great extra practice on informational text while still being seasonal, but not too Halloween specifically. It is a great balance for classes who might have a large population of students who do not celebrate Halloween.
The only nitpick I would share about this one, and it is a tiny nitpick, is that the articles do not come with an answer key. These articles would make for a great activity to do with a substitute, however I don’t like leaving the sub with nothing to guide them toward the answer, which makes a little more work on my part.
Lindsay Flood also has a Halloween & Fall paired passages product that I really enjoy as well.
Check out the other holiday items in Lindsay Flood’s store on TPT. I have found some great seasonal reading activities!
Halloween Reading Activities- Close Reading
Another product I really like on TPT is Kristine Nannini’s Halloween Close Reading Comprehension Passages. I think I bought this during distance learning because it came in a digital format and I was looking for something to use with my students to ‘celebrate’ Halloween. I loved that it included a digital option. One of the articles is about Punkin’ Chucking and it’s all about a competition of people who create sling shots to basically launch pumpkins as far as they can go! This product does include an answer key for the questions, making it a great activity for a substitute.
Jennifer Findley also has a Halloween Reading Comprehension passage pack. I find these are really nice to pull out if I need to put together some sub plans quickly. The passages are engaging and I love that they are easy to use with an answer key.
Fun Halloween Brain Teasers & Logic Puzzles
Here are a few paid products that I have purchased over the years and have found the students really enjoy.
October Crack the Code (one of my own creations)
Free Halloween Reading Activities for Upper Elementary Students on Teachers Pay Teachers
Teaching With a Mountain View Halloween Simile & Metaphor Task Card Freebie
Loving Lit’s Halloween Traditions & Urban Legends
Brain Waves Instruction’s Trick and Treat Figurative Langauge
Soaring Into Science Halloween Logic Puzzles
Shelly Rees Candy Corn Reading Passages
Rachel Lynette Halloween Word Riddles
I have also acquired a few good Halloween Idiom Freebie’s on TPT. Reviewing seasonal idioms and vocabulary is another way to continue to wrap vocabulary practice into an engaging reading lesson. Here are one of the many free Halloween Idioms I have used over the years.
Interestingly Speech and Language Pathologists have created quite a few products related to idioms and other figurative language. Often called SLPs (Speech/Language Pathologists), would be a great resource to discuss various resources because language and vocabulary is a huge part of their job training. They do more than practice articulation people!
Finally, I have a Free Halloween Making Words product in my TPT store. Students can manipulate the letters to make the mystery word Haunted House. This would be a great whole class, small group or center activity to do around Halloween. I also have a paid Halloween Making Words with 15 Halloween vocabulary words you can check out as well.
Halloween Reading: Picture Books for Upper Elementary Students
- Creepy Carrots by Aaron Reynolds- This book is constantly checked out at my school’s library. You can also use this adorable YouTube retelling by Reading Is.
- The Hallo-Weiner by Dan Pilkey- Oscar the Weiner dog deals with bullying in this delightful story that climaxes on Halloween Night as Oscar trick or treats as a hot dog! Dav Pilkey writes some of the best holiday themed material- my other favorite of his is the classic Thanksgiving tale, ‘Twas the Night Before Thanksgiving.
- Piggie Pie by Margie Palatini- This book can be used at any time of the year, but Gritch the Witch as the main character makes for a nice reading at Halloween. I love the use of allusion throughout the book. There is a classic nod to the Wizard of Oz in here. Biggie Pie would be a great mentor text for figurative language. It’s also a hoot and a fun book to read aloud to a class of big kids.
- The Little Old Lady Who Was Not Afraid of Anything by Linda Williams- There are two ways a teacher can use this book with older kids, first as a reread for their primary days. This is a fun book with lots of repetition. However, a teacher can also pivot into the darkness of this super creepy book and turn it into a story starter. I mean this little old lady is walking in the woods and she is followed. . . by a pumpkin (and other creepy clothing)! I have so many questions, the first one being why? Why is she being followed. If you want to give your students space to go dark, this book (often read to preschoolers) can be your guide.
Halloween Reading: Scary Books for the Upper Elementary Classroom
I like to remind students that if they are in the mood for a scary story, they can always check out the scary story bin of books in my classroom. A few of the books that I find are popular to stock in my scary story bin are:
- Small Spaces Quartet
- Wait Til Helen Comes (and any other Mary Downing Hahn book)
- Horowitz Horror
- Scary Stories to Tell In The Dark
- Uncle Montage’s Tales of Terror
If I had older students, I would happily stock the old R.L. Stine series, Fear Street. I LOVED those books growing up and I was sad to see his writing morph more into the Goosebumps realm of writing. Fear Street books seem like they are harder to get a hold of, any time I have purchased a copy it seems to be a used one online. They are fantastic for struggling readers who like scary stories.
Unfortunately the plot of almost all of them involve at least one person being murdered. . . hence the not super appropriate for 10 and 11 year olds. I will say, for me as a kid, I devoured these when I was in fifth grade. If you want to stock them in your classroom, you might find they are good to keep separate from the rest of the books and you can lend them with parent permission.
If you would like to read more about how I organize my classroom library, you can read all about it here.
Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark
I love the anthology series, Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark by Alvin Schwartz. Growing up, the kids at my school devoured these books. This series of books as well as other complications of scary stories are the perfect book to recommend to struggling readers . . . at least the struggling readers who like scary stories. They are the perfect thing for these students to read because they are highly engaging and very short. This makes them perfect for students who struggle to get into a book. These short stories get going with the action right away!
Scary Folk Tales?
I like to point out that Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark, as well as other anthology scary stories, are typically found in the non-fiction section of the school library- as well as most other libraries. I show the students the section that they can be found- the folk tale section.
Yes, these books are actually a bunch of folk tales. Think about what a folk tale is, a story that has been passed down over the ages by being told aloud instead of written down. Think of how people usually share scary stories- they tell them out loud. This makes Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark one of the most obvious folk tales ever.
If you look at the cover of Scary Stories, it says the stories were collected by Alvin Schwartz, not written by Alvin Schwartz. This makes them folk tales, which is why you will most likely find them in the non-fiction section of the library. I like to point this out, because the students that would benefit the most from reading them are most likely, the students who will not use the card catalog to look for these book, nor ask for helping finding these books in the library.
Teaching Mood & Tone Through Halloween Videos for Upper Elementary Students
Teaching mood and tone can be tricky. I like to use this time of the year to introduce mood and tone to my fifth grade students. If you are lucky enough to have access to Brain Pop, they have a pretty good overview of mood and tone.
Once the students have a general idea of what it is and the purpose of using mood in writing scary stories, I like to share with students a few of my favorite video shorts. I like that these clips are creepy, but not frightening enough that I would get a call from an upset parent. Everyone is different, though, so please watch these on your own to judge if they are appropriate for your classroom.
- Alma– This 5 minute short film is creeeeeeepy! There are so many areas to touch upon as a reading teacher- inferring, summarizing, and yes, mood & tone.
- Strangers– This is a great ode to Scary Stories to Tell in The Dark. I love the book the woman is reading on the train is Scary Stories. There is so much to work with and discuss from this short 3.5 minute clip.
- The Walk– This was created by the same team that made, Strangers. Out of the two, this one is scarier, even though nothing is said at all in the short clip. Again, lots of inferences to be made and more great reinforcement of mood/tone. Watch this first to decide if your students could handle this one.
Your Thoughts?
Do you do any special Halloween reading activities in your classroom? How do you like to celebrate the season? I would love to hear more ideas!
