Halloween Bingo Cards

A party game that keeps costumes in their seats

Halloween parties at school have a particular problem: thirty children in costumes who have been thinking about sweets since breakfast. Bingo works because it is seated, it has a rhythm, and every call is a small event. It also fits the day: the words are the things they have been drawing and reading about all week, and a child in a vampire costume marking "fangs" is as happy as a child can be in October.

At home it is a good game for a mixed-age party, where a six-year-old and a twelve-year-old can play on equal terms. The older children help the younger ones find squares, which keeps everyone busy without a referee.

Running the game

Call from the printed caller sheet, or put the caller on the projector so each word looms out of the dark in large letters. Say every word twice, with a bit of theatre: "Haunted... house." For early readers, hold up a picture or point to the word on the classroom word wall. Players mark their squares with a marker (candy corn works, and disappears at the end), and the first to a line shouts "Boo!"

Check the winner by reading their marked squares against your ticked sheet, hand over a prize, and start the next pattern on the same cards. Three rounds take about fifteen minutes.

Patterns with a Halloween shape

• Line to start.
• Witch's hat: the centre square, the three middle squares of the row below it, and the whole bottom row. Nine squares including the free centre.
• Cat's eyes: the 2 x 2 block in the top-left corner and the 2 x 2 block in the top-right corner, eight squares that look like a pair of eyes. It is two postage stamps, and about as quick as a line.
• Blackout renamed "midnight": every square. Save it for the end and let it run as the background game while the party moves on to the next activity.

Prizes

A Halloween party has prizes built in: let the winner choose first from the treat bowl, pick the next song, wear the teacher's witch hat for the next round, or be the one who turns the lights down. Stickers, glow sticks and spider rings cost almost nothing and are prize enough. At a home party, the winner's costume is declared "scariest" for the night.

Printing

• 4 per page on orange paper if you have it, black marker pens for marking. Orange paper prints fine on any laser or inkjet; black paper does not.
• Set the header row to "SPOOK" or "GHOST" (five letters) instead of BINGO, or leave it off for the youngest players.
• Give the game a title with the class name and year; a card from "3B Halloween Bingo 2026" sometimes ends up on a fridge.
• Print the caller sheet twice and cut one copy into slips to draw from a cauldron, if you have a cauldron, which you should.

The 50 squares in this list

Cards are 5 x 5 with a free centre square. Edit the list, add your own squares or change the card size above; the cards update as you type.

• Witch
• Black cat
• Pumpkin
• Jack-o'-lantern
• Ghost
• Skeleton
• Vampire
• Werewolf
• Mummy
• Zombie
• Bat
• Spider
• Cobweb
• Haunted house
• Cauldron
• Broomstick
• Candy corn
• Trick or treat
• Costume
• Mask
• Full moon
• Graveyard
• Tombstone
• Scarecrow
• Owl
• Raven
• Potion
• Spell book
• Frankenstein
• Monster
• Goblin
• Coffin
• Skull
• Bones
• Fangs
• Eyeball
• Boo!
• Creaky door
• Fog
• Cape
• Magic wand
• Treat bag
• Spooky
• Howl
• Candy apple
• Ghost story
• Corn maze
• Pumpkin patch
• Mad scientist
• Doorbell