School Events Calendar
Primary schools are busy places. There is always an event or activity in the school calendar. Topics often vary from local events to national and even international holidays.
Celebration and special awareness days can offer fun and valuable learning opportunities in school. But, there is a ‘national holiday’ every day, for everything!
Celebration and special awareness days can enrich learning in school, but they can’t all be given equal attention.
When deciding what topics to discuss with your class, or in your school, here’s a few points to consider…
- What is relevant to your pupils? (location, demographic, other curriculum topics, etc.)
- Is there a clear learning or awareness opportunity?
- What are the benefits of the topic to your pupils?
It is important to offer a wide variety of opportunities throughout the school year. From religious celebrations, sporting events, national holidays, awareness days and cultural festivities.
With so many topics, and the endless list of appreciation days, it can become overwhelming to choose the best focus area for your class. So, it important to plan ahead. Leave enough time to discuss topics and prepare activities that will have the most positive impact on your pupils.
Additional Resources
In our resources section we have a calendar to help you choose the best current topics to celebrate. We are constantly updating and adding to this resource to offer a wide range of events for you.
Let’s have a look at a few of the topics…
World Book Day
World Book Day is a registered charity and this year celebrates with the message ‘Go All In’. “If you’re into it, read into it.”
Their aim is to encourage children to read more. The charity gives every child in education a voucher to buy a book of their choice; knowing that reading expands vocabulary, offers learning opportunities, improves concentration levels and helps creativity. This National Holiday, celebrated in the United Kingdom and Ireland, is always held on the first Thursday in March.
There is a World Book Day celebrated across the World, organised by UNESCO, on the 23rd April, but the UK also celebrate their own WBD as the April date falls in the Easter Holidays.
Some children may feel it is more fun to run around and play games than to read a book. We have therefore combined physically active games with WBD awareness to engage children into the wonderful world of reading. Take a look at our World Book Day resources here. We would love to hear your feedback.
International Friendship Day
The International Day of Friendship was created by the United Nations. It is celebrated on the 30th July every year and promotes the role that friendship plays in bringing peace between many different backgrounds.
The UN encourages governments and communities to hold events to promote solidarity and cross-cultural understanding across the World.
This is an opportunity for schools to raise awareness of the importance of building and keeping friendships. Friendships develop empathy and compassion in children and help them become more selfless and aware of other people’s situations. It can help bridge the gap between people of different cultures, religions, race, and backgrounds.
We feel that now more than ever, this is a topic the world needs and have therefore created PE resources to start at grass-roots. With all that is happening in Europe right now, we recommend that schools don’t wait until July to focus on this crucial topic.
Football World Cup
2026 is Football World Cup year! The tournament is being held in North America. The tournament will be spread across 16 cities… 11 in the United States, 3 in Mexico and 2 in Canada.
There will be a lot of excitement around this tournament with England getting to the final at the Euros. England and Scotland have already qualified, but Wales and Northern Ireland will fight for their spots in the March play-offs.
You can find our World Cup Resources in the June section of the Calendar. The games are fun, easy to follow and will really help to engage children into the event. Play these games as a special reward… and to help bring football home!
We hope you enjoy all our calendar resources. We are always adding to these so please keep a look out for new topics and additional resources.
If there’s a topic you’d like a resource for, but don’t see it on our website, please just give us a shout!! We’d love to hear your suggestions!
As always, we are here to help with anything PE, so please don’t hesitate to get in touch.
