Make your classroom Valentine’s party one the kids will love. Use our ideas for handmade valentines your child can share with classmates. Then check out some fun crafts and games for party time.Add a personal touch to your valentines

• Make a heart–shaped thumbprint signature using a red inkpad. Just overlap your thumbprints in a “V” pattern on your cards.
• You can also use the heart thumbprint idea (above) with sugar cookies. Roll the dough into 1-inch balls. Press your thumb hearts into the dough, and bake as directed. After they’ve baked, fill the heart indentations with strawberry jelly, melted chocolate or pink frosting. Give these out with your valentines.
• Turn leftover candy canes into chocolate–covered hearts. Arrange two mini candy canes into a heart shape. Knead a Tootsie Roll until it's pliable and use pieces to join the candy canes together at the top and bottom. Then dip the hearts into melted white or dark chocolate and place on waxed paper. After cooling them in the refrigerator, put them in baggies to hand out during the party.

I heart Valentine’s games

• Relay races: Divide the group into two or three teams. Have all the teams, one child at a time, carry conversation hearts or foam hearts across the room from one bowl to another bowl using a pair of chopsticks (easy) or by sucking them up to a straw (harder). When a child drops his heart, he has to go back to the beginning and try again.
• Matching game: Cut out heart shapes from construction paper and write a famous word pair on each heart (such as “peanut butter” and “jelly” or “salt” and “pepper”), then cut apart the hearts into two–piece puzzles with one word on each piece. Mix up the heart pieces, and give each child one piece. Then the children have to find their match.
• Stacking game: Have children build tall towers using conversation hearts. They can race for a set time, such as two minutes. The child with the highest tower that doesn't fall before the time is up wins. Kids will want to play this again and again.

Valentine’s crafts from the heart

• Recycle valentines from past years into this year’s valentine holders. Decorate a shoebox using scraps of construction paper, old valentines, stickers, doilies, ribbon, and even used foil and plastic candy wrappers cut into heart and flower shapes.
• Make marbled hearts using red and white Model Magic™. Using 1 part red to 3 parts white, combine the Model Magic until you’ve made pink. Take a small piece each of red, pink and white, and start blending them until the colors begin to swirl together (don’t blend too much—you want the colors to stay distinct). When you've got the right look, form the clay into a heart shape. With a pencil point, make a small hole near the top to thread a ribbon through, and use it as an ornament or necklace. If yours doesn't look quite like a heart, you can trim the edges with scissors after it’s dry.
• Craft some edible necklaces using cut-up licorice, Life Savers® and round cereal pieces to string onto long pieces of elastic. For younger kids, be sure to tape one end of the elastic to the table so the candy doesn’t fall off before you tie the elastic together. Older kids can use a needle to string gumdrops and other jelly candies onto a piece of strong, knotted thread.