Students love changing out the dramatic play center and one of my students’ favorites is a pizza dramatic play center! They love being able to make and sell the pizzas, as well as pretend to be the customers and order their favorite pizzas. The pizza dramatic play center is an easy center to set up and has a lot of great academic connections.
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Set up
If, like me, your base for a dramatic play center includes a pretend kitchen, then there isn’t a whole lot you need to set up a pizza dramatic play center. Whether you have a kitchen or not, you simply need plates and the posters and pictures included in my pizza dramatic play center product. I like to hang up the posters where students can really use the information to help enhance their play. For example, I put the word wall and menu where students can easily read the words to help them when they are ordering the pizza.
Bonus materials
You don’t need a whole lot to make this dramatic play center work, but there are some things you could add if you like. First, ask a local pizza place. They might donate a couple of unused pizza boxes for you! At the very least, you could ask about the circle cardboard pieces they often have and that could be great pretend pizzas. Students could draw on them the different types of pizza this pizza shop offers. Other tools that could be good to have, but aren’t necessary, are rolling pins and pizza cutters.
Literacy connection
There are some great literacy connections to this pizza dramatic play center. The ordering form is an easy and engaging connection. Reluctant readers and writers will have no problem reading and writing with a purpose in their play. Additionally, students will enhance their informational reading and writing with the step-by-step guide included on how to make a pizza. This is a great example for the kind of informational writing you might expect them to write. It also helps them to see why informational writing is helpful! Finally, you might want to put out recipe cards for students to make their own pizzas. They will use the word wall to help them write down the ingredients needed to make that pizza.
Math connection in the pizza dramatic play center
Whenever students are pretending to buy anything there is always a great math connection to their play. In addition, students will be talking about sizes and comparing small to large pizzas. Finally, students will be counting the different topics on their pizzas. You can also connect to learning about time with the hours poster for the pizza shop.
Conclusion
A pizza dramatic play center is very easy to set up and extremely engaging for young students. Students will love making and selling the pizzas, as well as buying and eating them. Try it out for yourself and comment below with how much your students loved it!
