Instead of a digital template, have students create "Physical Instagram Stories" using cardstock and sticky notes. Draw the "photo" and write captions by hand. Have students gallery walk to "like" and "comment" on work using real markers and Post-it notes.

Shared by @jleeTechPercent on Twitter/X.

Whether it’s sculpting a biological cell or a scene from a novel, the tactile nature of clay forces students to think about structure and detail in a way a textbook diagram simply cannot.

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Give students a photocopied page of a text (even an old textbook page!). Have them use Sharpies to black out everything except for specific words that, when read together, create a poem or a summary of the topic. It’s a creative way to practice "deleting the fluff" and finding the core message.

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Cover your student desks or tables in butcher paper. Pose a "big question" or a central theme in the middle of each table. Students move from table to table, "tagging" the paper with their thoughts, questions, or sketches related to the topic. It turns the entire room into a collaborative, living document.

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Instead of reading a biography, have one student "become" the historical figure or book character. Other students must prepare and ask "juicy" interview questions. The student in the "Hot Seat" must answer based on their knowledge of the person’s life and motivations, fostering deep empathy and research skills.

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Ditch the bulleted list. Encourage students to map out relationships between ideas using icons, arrows, and bubbles. This aligns with Dr. Pooja Agarwal’s research on retrieval practice—drawing makes information stick.

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Print "Guess Who" boards featuring historical figures, novel characters, or artists. Slide them into plastic sleeve protectors and let students play using dry-erase markers. It’s a perfect, reusable review game.

Pro tip: Give them a blank template in Google Classroom and they make their own pop culture collections to play with friends.

Shared by Danette Krueger in the Ditch That That Textbook Community

Have students curate an ABC book of unit vocabulary. They define the word, use it in a sentence, and hand-illustrate the concept. It creates a colorful, personal reference they’ll actually want to keep.

Shared by Katie Natuzzi in the Ditch That Textbook Community

Get students moving by hiding "Task Cards" around the room or school. Each card contains a piece of a puzzle or a problem to solve. The answer to one card leads students to the physical location of the next, turning a standard review into a race. 

Pro tip: Use AI to help you build your scavenger hunt. List all of the places you want to hide the cards and have it help you create clues to the next location.

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Use a class storyline—like being stranded on a reef. Then have students create something based on your curriculum using that theme. For example Catherine has her students design original creatures by combining vertebrate and invertebrate traits, building 3D paper models to display in an interactive hallway exhibit.

Shared by Catherine Mattison in the Ditch That Textbook Community

Have students create something with their year's worth of knowledge. In Doug's class students use chemistry to engineer a physical airbag. They calculate the exact amount of vinegar and baking soda needed to save a Ken and Barbie from a desk-top crash.

Shared by Doug Showell in the Ditch That Textbook Community

Teach logic and sequencing without a screen. One student is the "programmer" and the other is the "robot." The programmer must give precise, step-by-step oral or written instructions (commands) to get the robot to perform a task, like drawing a circle or navigating an "obstacle course" of desks.

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Give each student a specific event or date on a piece of paper. Without talking (or with limited talking), students must organize themselves in the correct chronological order across the room. Once in line, they "present" their event to show how one led to the next.

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In this twist on "Found Poetry," students use the entire library as a word bank by stacking book spines so their titles form an original poem or story. To replicate this, have students scavenge the shelves for titles, physically arrange the books in order, and use up to 20 handwritten transitional words on paper strips to bridge the ideas together. Finally, students write an author’s purpose statement to explain their creative choices and snap a "Shelfie" of their finished stack to document the work—a perfect way to spark summer reading interest!

Shared by Tamika Hathaway in the Ditch That Textbook Community

Have students select a historical figure, group, or innovation and analyze how they would react to your local town in the present day. Students move beyond basic facts by researching their subject's motivations to provide a live "in-character" take or a creative presentation on modern society. This "historical cosplay" encourages deep empathy and critical thinking as students imagine a person from the Renaissance or Industrial Revolution navigating the culture and technology of 2026.

Shared by Rimmey in the Ditch That Textbook Community

To replicate the "Survival Game" review, transform your final exam prep into a multi-day team competition where students work in "tribes" to complete daily hands-on challenges. Instead of traditional worksheets, groups earn points by tackling curriculum-based tasks—like engineering pasta cars for a physics race or designing their own review games—all leading up to a grand prize. It turns high-stakes testing into a collaborative, high-energy event that replaces the stress of exams with a memorable classroom tradition.

Shared by Tammy Applegate in the Ditch That Textbook Community