Cut out button size pieces of construction paper that can be fastened onto students' shirts with tape. Have each student design a button to promote herself as a candidate. Instruct them to think of a campaign slogan or platform that can be designed to fit the button. The students will color their buttons and then put them on to wear throughout election day.
Develop math worksheets that have an election and voting on them. Think of different problems that integrate the themes of voting. For example, create a mock election with results and have students tabulate things like percentage of female voters for a specific candidate or percentage of voters for candidate A over the age of 65. There can be many different "voting math" questions that can get students doing higher level math without realizing it because their focus will be on the election theme.
For older elementary students that have been studying the election process, play election vocabulary BINGO. This is played like BINGO except words are called out instead of column/numbers. Students will be given a blank 5-by-5 chart to complete with the vocabulary words of their choice and placement. Word examples include mudslinging, candidate, primary election, platform and absentee voting. You will draw the words out of a hat, but instead of reading the word, you will give the definition. It is then up to the students to correctly figure out the vocabulary word and cover it up if they have it on their sheets.
Students will research the different candidates that are involved in the election and make trading cards out of the information they find. The students can find pictures of the candidates on the Internet or in magazines and newspapers. They will cut out the pictures and glue them to one side of a card size piece of construction paper. On the other side, they will list the information that they found through their search of the candidate. Have them look for information such as age, hometown, where they went to college and political views. Students can then trade the cards to find out information on different candidates.