Five Creative and Inexpensive Valentine’s Day Ideas

As a teacher, you know how fun it is for your students to celebrate special occasions like Valentine’s Day. But that doesn’t mean you have to break the bank — there are plenty of fun and creative ways to make the day special without spending a lot of money. From DIY dough and read alouds to fine motor activities and more, we’ve put together five cost-effective ideas sure to bring big smiles from your students on February 14th! Read on for some awesome Valentine’s Day ideas with surprisingly small price tags.

Read Alouds 

When you’re looking for creative and inexpensive Valentine’s Day ideas, it doesn’t get much easier than read alouds! Although it’s nice to buy an occasional book to book your classroom library, you don’t have to spend $$$ to get your hands on some great books.

You can find inexpensive or free books by…

  • Borrowing from the school or your town library
  • Borrowing from a teacher friend (my K teammates and I rotate books throughout the week – just put them in your teammates’ mailbox at the end of the day!)
  • Shop used books online through Amazon or eBay
  • Use Scholastic points toward seasonal books

I have a roundup of my favorite Valentine’s Day read alouds and you can find it by clicking here!

free valentine's day ideas and read alouds

Valentine’s Day Videos for Kids

I never show a ton of videos in the classroom and I’m pretty picky about quality, as I’m sure you are! Here are a few Valentine’s Day videos that I personally recommend:

  • PBS Kids – There’s a seasonal tab you can click for Valentine’s Day videos from Pinkalicious, Word World, and more)
  • Mystery Science – There are Valentine’s Day-themed videos such as “Who Invented Candy?” and “Where Does Chocolate Come From?”.
  • “If You Give a Mouse a Valentine’s Day Cookie” from Amazon Prime Video – This requires a subscription, but check it out if you have access!

Valentine’s Day Fine Motor Activities

Fine motor activities are creative and hands-on, but it can feel overwhelming knowing how or where to get started. One easy and inexpensive way is to prep already made activities and just add the fine motor tools!

My Valentine’s Day Fine Motor Pack has many activities that help add fine motor work without the extra hassle of coming up with the ideas! You can pick and choose the activities or use them all. If you don’t have a dedicated fine motor area in your classroom, add them to morning tubs!

fine motor valentine's day ideas

Free Candy Heart Math Mini Book

One of my most popular free activities on TPT is this Candy Conversation Heart Mini Book! It has several pages that use candy hearts to practice kindergarten math skills including counting, estimation, non-standard measurement, ten frames, comparing sets, and addition!

free valentine's day ideas for kindergarten math

You’ll love that this activity goes beyond the typical sorting and graphing of conversation hearts, and your students will love the interactive and edible fun!

Make Valentine’s Day Playdough

Lots of kindergarten teachers use playdough and although I tend to buy it often, making it is actually really easy! I have an awesome strawberry-scented homemade playdough recipe that’s just perfect for Valentine’s Day. I added these glitter hearts and strawberry extract to my go-to playdough recipe and I just love how it turned out!

free valentine's day ideas for kindergarten

You can use the playdough in a lot of ways, including these free Valentine’s Day-themed number mats. They’re a great multisensory approach to practicing ten frames.

free valentine's day ideas

If you’d like to download the recipe and the number mats for free, just fill out the form below and they’ll be sent straight to your inbox!

I hope you and your students have a wonderful Valentine’s Day! Be sure to follow me on Instagram (@kroltgen) for more ideas!

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