Middle School April Fools Day Lesson

Are you looking for a middle school April Fools Day lesson? Depending on who you are and where you live, you may have never experienced the pranks associated with the first day of April or you may find yourself the victim (or perpetrator) or yearly hijinks.

No matter which category you fall into though, April Fools’ Day can be a humorous and entertaining holiday to learn more about. Unfortunately, a middle school April Fools Day lesson can be hard to find. Learning about April Fools’ Day in the classroom can help our students understand the importance of being mindful when pranking or joking around with their peers.

It is an interesting way of looking at a historical topic and how humour has developed over time. What we find funny today, was probably not funny in the past. Humour evolves over time. Helping students build background knowledge and understanding of world cultures – whether we are talking about solemn religious holidays or prank-filled annual celebrations – is an important goal no matter who your students are or where they are from.

Teaching students about April Fools’ Day also shows students the value of critical thinking, as it is important they learn to consider information sources and discern what is true and false. Using my Fake News Unit as a follow up to April Fools Day provides great lessons on information sources.

Middle School April Fools Day Lesson

I use the Article of the Week format to help my students build their background knowledge. To help with this knowledge building, you can use this middle school April Fools’ Day lesson plan that is focused on a nonfiction article. In it, students will learn about the history, background, and tradition of this quirky holiday.

This middle school April Fools’ Day lesson contains one nonfiction article and three reading activities to assist with reading comprehension, standardized test prep (EQAO), and cross-curricular learning. It comes in both PDF and digital formats to help teachers who are teaching both in the physical and digital classrooms. Find this resource on Shopify CAD or Teachers Pay Teachers USD.

Resource Includes:

Teacher lesson plan
Pre-reading K-W-L chart
Non-fiction article (regular and modified texts)
Mp3 audio files of each reading
3 Post-reading activities: comprehension questions, grammar questions (2 options: paper and self-grading Google Forms), long answer writing response
Individual PDFs of student pages to assist with online learning i.e. Google Classroom
Google Slides formatted lessons for 1:1 school

April Fools Day Pranks

Have fun with your students with these April Fools’ Day pranks. There are 5 different activities included: multiple choice questions, graphic organizers and a 3, 2, 1 Chart. Students will watch 4 interesting videos about high-interest topics such as flying penguins and house hippos. Then they can answer the multiple-choice questions. Students can also read several different fake websites and complete a 3, 2, 1 Chart about all the new information they learned.

Resource Includes:

Teacher Instructions
Student Pranks
Graphic Organizers
Answer Keys
Individual PDFs for Google Drive
Google Slides format

Find this resource on Shopify CAD or Teachers Pay Teachers USD.

If your students love these fake lessons have them try this Fake News Unit. This resource contains 5 high-interest lessons to help students understand what fake news is and how to spot it. Use these middle school April Fools Day lesson ideas with your students to bring some fun into your classroom.

Hopefully, learning about April Fools’ Day can spark a conversation about the power of words (and how they can hurt people as much as physical violence), good versus bad pranks and how actions have consequences.