At the beginning of the school year, use a hallway bulletin board display to highlight some of the important educational units that the fifth grade team will be working on during the coming school year. For instance, if you will be working on owl pellets in science, dedicate a bulletin board to the unit, showing students what an owl pellet is, examples of dissected ones and what a student can expect to find in a pellet. Add colorful pictures and even cartoon-ish bubbles saying "Yuck," and, "Weird," over the owl pellet illustrations to catch your students' eyes and build intrigue about this future science activity.
A creative bulletin board display is an excellent way to get students to know their fellow classmates. First, choose a theme, such as soccer, for your board. Draw or create a construction paper soccer net to be used as the background, and place a title over your board. For example, your title could be "My Fifth-Grade Goals." On the first day of school, hand out ball-shaped pieces of paper to your students and ask them to write their name and something they hope to learn or accomplish in fifth grade on the ball. If soccer is not your thing, choose another theme that will work for you.
Periodically, students should be informed that you will be displaying a particular project on a classroom or hallway bulletin board. This will often motivate students to produce their best work. In addition, students may learn new concepts and ideas by studying a classmate's handiwork that they can use on future projects of their own. Decorate the bulletin board with colorful borders to frame the work, and make a heading out of die-cut letters to explain what is being displayed. Student papers and projects should not be graded before being put on display.
During the school year, and especially as the year winds down, the fifth-grade bulletin board can be used for some fun activities. For instance, if fifth grade is the last year of elementary school in your school district, create displays that affectionately honor your departing students. Have students bring in baby pictures and post them to a board and have a contest to see who can correctly guess the identity of each, or ask students to write a favorite memory of school to be displayed on a bulletin board.