The Activity Bank

The GIVE Activity Bank is a resource bank of short activities or skill-based tasks that already include supports and accommodations to meet a range of students’ needs. These activities can be easily added to your lesson—with small adjustments for your unique students and classroom—to make it more inclusive.

These activities have been submitted as is by New York City Teaching Artists from New Victory Theater, ArtsConnection, and Community-Word Project.

Submit site search

  • Finding a Partner or Small Group

    Ages: Early Childhood (PK-2), Upper Elementary (3-5), Middle School (6-8), High School (9-12)
    Art Forms: Theater, Music, Media Arts, Dance

    This transition or skill-building activity provides strategies and techniques to create pairs/small groups in intentional and fun ways that build classroom com…

  • Headline Of The Day

    Ages: Upper Elementary (3-5), Middle School (6-8), High School (9-12)
    Art Forms: Literary Arts, Media Arts

    In this short and fun closing activity, students collectively reflect on the session by creating headlines.

  • Magic Trick Animation

    Ages: Upper Elementary (3-5), Middle School (6-8), High School (9-12)
    Art Forms: Media Arts

    In this activity, students will be magicians and use sticky notes, their hands, and a prop to create the illusion of objects appearing, disappearing, and switc…

  • Making Foley Sounds

    Ages: Upper Elementary (3-5), Middle School (6-8), High School (9-12)
    Art Forms: Media Arts, Music, Theater

    This activity helps students discover how the sounds used in movies and animations are created behind the scenes, by practicing making sounds with various obje…

  • Moving Object Stop Motion

    Ages: Middle School (6-8), High School (9-12)
    Art Forms: Visual Arts, Theater, Media Arts

    In this playful skill-building activity, students collaborate to create a short animation of an object moving across a surface on its own. This is a great acti…

  • Names and Weather Patterns

    Ages: Upper Elementary (3-5), Middle School (6-8)
    Art Forms: Music, Visual Arts, Media Arts, Literary Arts, Dance, Theater

    This warm-up activity supports learning everyone’s names and pronouns,  bringing imagination into the room, becoming observant of the world around us, and lear…

  • Pass the Love

    Ages: Early Childhood (PK-2), Upper Elementary (3-5), Middle School (6-8), High School (9-12)
    Art Forms: Visual Arts, Dance, Literary Arts, Media Arts, Music, Theater

    A closing ritual to reflect on the lesson, and to take a moment together as a whole class ensemble.

  • Personal Crests

    Ages: Upper Elementary (3-5), Middle School (6-8)
    Art Forms: Media Arts, Visual Arts

    This visual arts activity encourages students to explore identity, promotes community building, and introduces the concept of symbolism.