The Ultimate Guide to Hands-on Learning Activities for Middle School
Using hands-on learning activities is the best way to get and keep middle school students engaged and to help them learn. My favorite subjects to add projects to are middle school geography, history, and science.
As children move through the middle school years they begin to think more critically and ask many “why” questions. It is not enough to read a fact in a book, they want to test theories and explore possibilities for themselves and hands-on learning activities help to achieve that goal.
Middle school students are also becoming more independent learners. Often they can complete hands-on learning activities with little help from adults. Learning to follow directions and working through a problem in a step-by-step fashion are important skills to develop at this age.
With the help of our friends we have gathered many wonderful hands-on learning activities for middle school students in the areas of Art, Field Trips, History & Geography, Language Arts, Life Skills, Math, and Science.
Hopefully this list will be a resource you can refer back to whenever you’re looking for an interesting project to enhance your learning.
This post contains affiliate links.
Art
Art Project: Tomb Walls – Combine Art and History!
Celebrating Spring with Chalk Art
Cherry Blossoms in Porcelain Vase Art Project – Asian Theme Art Lesson
Create a Stained Glass Rose Window
Everything You Need for a Cezanne Study
Fruit and Veggie Art – Examine positive and negative shapes in a piece of fruit or a veggie
Independent Art Project: Wassily Kandinsky
Learning About Perspective Part I
Learning Art History With Home School In The Woods
Studying Baroque Music with SQUILT
Studying the Masters with Mixed Media
Field trips
6 Things My Older Kids Enjoy at LEGOLAND Florida
7 Places to Homeschool Away From Home in Central Florida
Bring Science to Life at the Aquarium
Digging Up Some Fun at Dinosaur World
Five Reasons to Visit Bok Tower Gardens
Learning at Epcot’s Behind the Seeds Tour
Learning at Epcot’s Food & Wine Festival
LEGO Store – So Much to Explore
Literature Lessons from Disney’s Magic Kingdom
Meet African Animals at Disney’s Animal Kingdom
Meet the Manatees at Blue Springs State Park
Studying History While Visiting the Magic Kingdom
Sweet, Tart Cranberries
Washed Ashore: Art to Save the Sea
What Older Kids Can Learn at the Epcot Flower & Garden Festival
History & Geography
5 Easy Colonial America Map Activities for Kids
6 Covered Wagon Learning Activities
Ben Franklin: Inventions and Hands-on History
Build an Edible Ancient Temple
Building Geography Skills with Topographic Maps
Discover the 13 Colonies Notebooking and Activities
Draw Your Own Cartouche: Personalized Hieroglyphics
Geography Activities: Atlas Scavenger Hunt
Geography Challenge – Boarders, Countries & Continental Drift
Great World War II Projects You Can Build Yourself
Have Fun with American Heroes: Activities, Projects, and Fascinating Facts
Historical Cooking: Native American Corn Recipes
How to Use American Girl to Study History
Latitude and Longitude Scavenger Hunt
Make a Seven Wonders of the World Brochure
Medieval Fashion: Peasant Girl
Paper Soldiers and Wargames from Junior General
Re-enact History with Duct Tape
Spice Up Your Geography Lessons With Regional Foods
Study the American Revolution by Combining Art and History
Studying Geography with Regional Foods: Russia
The Civil War For Kids: A History With 21 Activities
Time Travelers History Study Series Review
Why did the United States enter the Vietnam War
Language arts
A Midsummer Night’s Dream Poem
Activities & Projects to Honor Hans Christian Andersen
Around the World in 80 Days – Book Study & Activities
Cause and Effect Card Game Activity
Compare and Contrast – Diagram a Story
Free Literature Resources for Great Classics!
Fun Family Activities for Mr. Popper’s Penguins
Having Fun With the Penderwicks
The Hobbit – Study While Playing Minecraft
How to Write a Detailed Procedure
Make a Travel Diary – Practice writing skills on a family vacation
Making a Diorama of Dante’s Inferno
Mary Poppins Book Study and Activities
Peter Pan – Learning Activities
Play Minecraft and Join Your Favorite Books
Robert Frost Study art, resources, rhyme scheme, poetry notebooks
Romeo and Juliet Poem for Kids
Shakespeare: facts, resources, trips, cake
The Secret Garden Book Study & Activities
World Study Guides for Classic Literature
Life skills
Bridge Builder Instant Challenge ~ Logic for Kids
Building Life Skills with FIRST LEGO League (FLL)
Make a Sequence Sandwich – Learn to decipher directions and practice sequencing
State the Pros and Cons by Hosting a Mock Debate
Teaching Kids Life Skills: Food Shopping
Teaching Kids Life Skills: Goal Setting
Teaching Kids Life Skills: How to Tie a Necktie
Teaching Kids Life Skills: Managing Schedules
Teaching Kids Life Skills: Money Management
Teaching Kids Life Skills: Sewing
Teaching Kids Life Skills: Thank You Notes
Teaching Kids to Cook ~ Epcot Food & Wine
Teaching My Kids About Meal Planning Was “Easy as Pie”
Teaching Values through Service and Leadership
Weekly Homeschool Planning Meeting with Multiple Ages
What Our Kids Can Learn From Famous Inventors – The Benefits of Making Mistakes
Math
Hands-On Math: Graphing Fun
Life of Fred Played in Minecraft
Living Math: A Round-up of Resources
Math Projects: 50 Hands-On Projects that Correlate to Specific Math Concepts, Grades 5-8+
Number Rings: A Cool Math Game
Real-Life Math : Grocery Store Challenge
Simple Game for Building Mental Math Skills
Three Games You Can Make in Five Minutes
Science
Build a Potato Cannon to learn the principle of Boyle’s Law
Easy Science Projects for Studying Friction
Encouraging Girls in STEM
Engineering Science with the World’s Tallest Buildings Unit Study
Experiment with Magnetism: Make a Hanging Compass
Explore Genetics by Finding Family Traits
Exploring Alternative Energy: Hydroelectric Dams
Freezer Bubbles, An Easy Science Experiment
Geology Rocks! Learning about Rocks and Minerals
Groovy Science Activity – Make Your Own Lava Lamp
Gumdrop Structures Engineering Challenge
Hands-on Activities for Weather
How Do Oil Spills Harm Wildlife?
How to Make a Tornado in a Bottle
How to Make an Edible Cell Model
Science Activities to Learn About Levers
Simple Science: Catapults and Trajectory
Spin the Bucket: A Centripetal Force Experiment
The Lab Report – Making A Polymer Ball
Blogs, Link-ups & Online Resources
Be sure to check out our favorite online resources for middle school hands-on learning:
Eva Varga (aka Academia Celestia)
Hodgepodge
Weird, Unsocialized Homeschoolers
At Curriculum Choice you will find an Ultimate Guide to Choosing Middle School Curriculum by the review authors. The authors at the Curriculum Choice have many, many years of experience teaching middle school between them. They’ve joined together to help you feel confident teaching middle school, too! The following are some of the many middle school reviews our Curriculum Choice authors have written. You’ll enjoy learning more about the plethora of resources available to you as you teach 6th-8th graders!
Homeschooling Middle School with Pinterest
Thank you so much for including a couple of our resource posts. Pinning this guide to our Middle School Homeschool Board. Needing it in the next year or 2!
Thank you Thaleia for your great resources!
WOW, Susan, this is an epic post. I’ll say it’s indeed the Ultimate guide. Thanks for putting it together. Will share around 🙂 Just wonderful!
Thank you Meredith! It was fun to pull this together and my kids are thrilled with all of these new ideas!
Well, I will be coming back to it many times I am sure 🙂
Just hopped over from the linkup. Hooray for this awesome list of resources! Got it pinned 🙂
What a GREAT resource!!!!!!! Thanks for sharing on the after school linky!
Wonder list. I’m knee-deep in homeschooling my third middle schooler, with four more coming behind. I love/dread these years as I’ve found them to be not-little but not-big for both the Momma and the student, which can be a tricky balance! Trying to grab on to the joy and not grit my teeth and wait for the high school fun! Lol
Pinning! Thanks for sharing our art project. 🙂 We just finished another Art From History piece, but it’s not up on the blog yet.
I’m a firm believer in hands-on learning – experience is the best teacher!
Love this list of resources and ideas – thank you so much for putting it together. I’m featuring it today on the Hearts for Home Blog Hop:)
Such a great list!