Bulletin Board Ideas for Back to School

Bulletin board ideas for back to school got you down? I’m that teacher. You know, the one. I plan everything for the start of the school year before the year ends so I can fully enjoy my summer vacation. This year was no exception.

As the 4th marking period was coming to a close, I kept pondering bulletin board ideas until I had the perfect idea: hot air balloons!

Practice Makes Perfect

Students are given a game board which has columns and rows with different designs or decorations on them. They roll the dice to pick up all the elements they’ll need to create their hot air balloon.

When they begin practice drawing, I position myself at the front of the room by my Elmo/enoboard. I will call out if anyone has a particularly difficult shape and then we problem-solve how to tackle it.

I demonstrate for those students while others continue drawing. Then I move on to the next difficult shape and work with whoever is tackling that one, and so on. I never want my students to feel like I’m giving them this hard task and I’m over at my desk painting my fingernails, making a shopping list, or texting all my BFFs (as if!) You know, I might be asking them what bulletin boards ideas for back to school they have in their back pocket. <winky, winky>

Designing the Hot Air Balloon Bulletin Board

After practicing, they draw and cut out two balloons on white paper and fold them to make sections. Each design will be drawn on a different section with the backside of one of the two balloons left empty. It’s the back. No one will see it!

For this next part, regular ol’ markers are fine. I prefer to use the thick markers wherever possible. I tell them to take their time and outline all the shapes they drew.

They can also outline the negative spaces (think: the inside of a doughnut) in a different color for fun. If they want the background area to be anything but white, they’ll have to outline that, too.

Color the World

Here’s where the magic begins. Give every student a small cup of water. Don’t be cheap and give them a dinky little short cup. Kids like to put their brush in the water; if the cup is too short, the brush will hang out and likely fall. Ask an art teacher how she knows!

They will then use the brush to paint in the shapes they outlined. Yes, I said, “paint!” The marker acts like paint. They can use the brush to push around the “paint,” too.

Trust me when I tell you how bright and wide your student’s eyes will be once they realize how simple and fun it is. They love the idea that they can “paint” with markers. It’ll change their life. The key is the barely wet the brush. If it’s too wet, the paper will buckle. That’s fancy art teacher talk for bend and look all wavy. It looks like frizzy hair in a heat wave. No one wants that.

Instruct your students to paint one section at a time, letting each piece dry before flipping to paint a part on the adjacent side. Once all the pieces are painted, let them dry, dry, dry.

Then they can cut out a simple basket shape from construction paper and prepare two pieces of yarn of a similar length.

Next, assemble and glue all the pieces. Just make sure your students flip up the inside balloon section so it pops out and has that 3D effect. If you find you can’t get that effect from regular white glue, go the hot glue route. A couple dabs just to keep it in place will do, if need be.

Your student’s balloons are ready for display!