Dive into the Exciting World of the Vikings!
Ready to explore the fascinating world of the Vikings? Whether you’re teaching a homeschool history lesson or planning a classroom unit, this Viking unit study is packed with hands-on crafts, engaging read-alouds, and fun Viking activities for kids in elementary school.
This year in our homeschool, we’re studying the Middle Ages, and after wrapping up our unit on the Byzantine Empire, we sailed straight into Viking territory—and wow, what an adventure it’s been!
As always, my goal is to make history come alive for children. And there are so many wonderful ways to bring the Viking era to life through curiosity-peaking books, crafts, and interactive learning.
Let’s look at the best Viking books for kids first and then dive into 10 fun Viking crafts & activities!
Best Viking Books for Kids
A good unit study starts with great books! Here are our favorite Viking books and read-alouds for children. (I’ll link each one below for easy access on Amazon.)
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Textbooks About Vikings
We leaned heavily on The Story of the World, Volume 2: The Middle Ages, which gives a clear, engaging overview of the Vikings in kid-friendly language. My children always enjoy the storytelling approach!
But hands down, our favorite “textbook” was The Usborne Time Traveler. It’s filled with colorful illustrations and fascinating scenes of Viking life—longhouses, ships, raids, farming, and even Viking funerals. Filled with colorful pictures and detailed descriptions, all four of my kids agreed this was their favorite history book!
Other Viking Book Favorites for Kids
Eric the Red and Leif the Lucky by Barbara Schiller – A perfect Viking picture book for grades K–3. It introduces two of the most famous Viking explorers in a gentle, engaging way but holds a lot of information!
Magic Treehouse #15: Viking Ships at Sunrise – A fun historical fiction choice for 2nd–4th graders who love the Magic Treehouse series and are eager to read independently.
Viking Adventure by Clyde Robert Bulla – Best for grades 3–5, this story follows a young Viking boy on an ocean voyage to North America.
The Vikings by Elizabeth Janeway – A great choice for older elementary or middle schoolers who want a deeper look at the lives of Eric the Red and Leif Erikson through historical fiction.
The Story of Rolf and the Viking’s Bow by Allen French – A fantastic family read-aloud for upper elementary or middle school. Though written in old-fashioned language, it’s rich with adventure and moral lessons. If your students want to tackle it alone, it’s best for high school students as an independent read. This one is a little tough, but worth the effort!
Introduction to Norse Mythology for Kids – A intro to the myths, gods, monsters, heroes, and day-to-day life and culture of the Vikings – best for upper elementary, middle school, and older.
Live Like a Viking: Discovering the Secrets of the Vikings by Claire Saunders – a fresh informational book about all things Vikings with fun illustrations, crafts, and activities.
Looking for even more Middle Ages books for kids? I have you covered!
10 Hands-On Viking Activities & Crafts for Elementary Kids
Reading wholesome books is always the backbone of our homeschool instruction, but with our Viking unit study, the hands-on learning really stole the show! These 10 fun Viking crafts and activities for kids made history truly come alive.
1. Vikings PowerPoint
We kicked off our study with a colorful, kid-friendly Vikings PowerPoint from TPT. It’s the perfect introduction to Viking culture and history for early elementary learners – ideal for homeschool or co-op lessons! Plus, it’s editable, so you can tweak it to your own specifics!
Vikings PowerPoint
Bring history to life with this editable Vikings PowerPoint for elementary students! Perfect for grades 1–4.
2. Viking Fact Chart
While presenting the PowerPoint, students used this Viking Fact Sheet to color and record key facts. To make it interactive, I let students pick which Viking topic to learn about next – longships, food, weapons, etc. – and we explored those slides together. It kept everyone engaged and excited! The kids liked being in charge of the sequence of our learning!
Vikings Fact Chart
Kids can color along as your go through the powerpoint – or keep this as a fact chart to jog their memory about what they’ve learned about the Vikings.
3. Watch Viking Videos for Kids
YouTube is full of short, kid-appropriate videos about Viking history. We watched clips showing Viking ships, daily life, and famous explorers – it really helped bring our lessons to life! We also looked up images and videos showing ancient Viking runestones.
4. Viking Flash Cards Game
To review what we’d learned, we used my Viking Flash Cards, also available on TPT. We played an interactive class-favorite game called “I Have, Who Has?” where each child matched Viking vocabulary cards like “longship” and “shield.” The kids loved it and begged to play again! So we used the flash cards several classes in a row! Definitely a hit!
Viking Flash Cards
Teach Viking vocabulary in a fun, interactive way using these bright, kid-friendly flash cards!
5. Viking Geography
No history lesson is complete without maps! We traced Viking voyages using maps from The Story of the World Activity Book: Middle Ages and color-coded their routes from Scandinavia to Iceland, Greenland, and even North America – centuries before Columbus!
This detailed, interactive map from VikingsBrand shows all the Viking raids, trade routes, voyages, and settlements of the Vikings from 793 to 1066 AD and is incredibly helpful for making the geography interesting and relatable for young students. You can click on any point or route for detailed information!
Map: Interactive Viking World Map by VikingsBrand
6. Famous Viking Explorers
Of course, no Viking study is complete without Erik the Red and Leif Erikson. We watched short videos detailing archaeological evidence of Vikings in North America and traced their journeys on our maps (try the one above!), as well as reading about them in our history books.
7. Viking Helmet, Shield & Axe Craft
Our absolute favorite craft was making our own Viking helmets, shields, and axes! Using my printable Viking Helmet Craft, available on TPT, the kids created paper armor for Viking Day. We invited the kids to dress up wearing Viking clothing, too! This simple cut-and-glue craft is easy to prep and perfect for a classroom or homeschool co-op – and just right for our dress-up day!
Viking Helmet Craft + Shield & Axe
Students can create their own printable Viking helmet headband (crown), then complete the look with a Viking shield and battle axe.
8. Viking Longship Craft
We used the pattern from Story of the World Activity Book: Middle Ages to build Viking longships out of cardstock. These came out so well! We just added little paper sails and small Viking figures to make it more fun. This was another hit!
9. Write Your Name in Viking Runes!
Next up, we learned how to write our names using Viking runes! Runestone Norway offers a super fun free online tool that shows kids how their name appears in authentic Viking Runes. It even has an option to display the kids’ names in Younger Futhark, the 16-rune alphabet actually used during the Viking Age. By this time period, Younger Futhark had largely replaced the older 24-rune Elder Futhark alphabet used earlier.
My kiddos really enjoyed seeing how their names appeared in Viking runes and writing their names on their papers and crafts this way!
Along with learning to write out names in Viking rune alphabet, we explored online some of the incredible photographs and videos of Viking runestones that are still in existence today – just Google it and hit images. How amazing!
10. Choose a Viking Name
For a fun twist, we each picked our own Viking nickname – mine was Amanda Longhair! In the PowerPoint, there’s a slide showing real Viking names like Ivar the Boneless and Astrid Wisdom-Slope, which inspired some very creative choices from the kids! We had a lot of laughs over our names!
A Viking Unit Study to Remember
Between the books, crafts, videos, and hands-on projects, our Viking unit study for elementary students was one of our most memorable history lessons ever! The kids learned so much while having a blast.
If you’re planning your own Viking activities for kids, be sure to check out my matching TPT resources. They’re also available as a bundle of all 4 resources, to save you time and money! What a great deal!
- The Vikings Bundle – BEST VALUE!
- Vikings PowerPoint
- Viking Fact Chart
- Viking Flash Cards
- Viking Helmet, Shield, and Axe Craft
The Vikings Bundle
Grab four incredible resources at once: the PowerPoint, Fact Chart, Flash Card Games, and Viking Helmet & Weapons Craft.
Note: You don’t have to be a classroom teacher to purchase resources on TeachersPayTeachers (TPT). Anyone can purchase by creating a free account.
Pair these with the wonderful Viking books listed above and you’ll have everything you need for a full, engaging Viking unit study your kids will never forget!
