It’s Christmas! Welcome to the North Pole!
I love how Christmas slowly creeps into a school during the first week of December and then, WHAM, it’s Christmas! There’s no avoiding it!
Every year I say to myself that I will begin my Christmas lessons earlier so I can do everything in my “fantastic, have to do this next year” file. I never get through that file, but everyone still has a great time and there are always smiles and plenty of glitter all around.
My school does Christmas in a big way, kicking it off with the annual tradition of Deck the Halls. The whole school decorates their halls and classrooms with decorations made by students for a whole afternoon. We play Christmas music throughout the school and Santa and Mrs. Claus visit to hand out candy canes. I had a great time walking with the VIPs and seeing the kids freak out, especially the Kindies!
Our primary wing decided to do a Santa’s workshop theme. We have so many creative teachers. Here are some photos of our Santa’s workshop hall and then some of the highlights of the rest of the school.
I decided to have our Firsties be elf applicants. We took photos of the kids’ faces and glued them to paper elf costumes that they made. We then displayed their elf application forms as well.
(sorry about the masked faces, I can’t post photos of my students)
I have never done this before, and always have wanted to (yes, it was in my fantastic file!), I just love how they are all so personalized.
Here are the printable templates for you.
For the bodies of the elf I just folded a piece of construction paper into fours and made house shapes. For the legs, feet, and hands, I asked the kids to draw and cut them out on their own.
On the day that we worked on the elves, I had to read my favouritest favouritest Christmas book, Auntie Claus. It’s about the most important elf, Santa’s sister. I love reading it because it takes place in Manhattan and the writing is filled with the word “darling”, which, I of course have to read as “dawwwwwling” I want to be Auntie Claus when I grow up!
We also made gingerbread men and women and houses for our display.
One of our Kindergarten teachers thought up of this idea!
Display gingerbread men on a tin foil cookie sheet!
Here’s is my favourite gingerbread man, I love how this little boy just went to town with every craft material he could get his hands on!
During this time my class were ambushed by gingerbread books too! Here are my favourites.
Well, just a few more days of teaching and I will be able to rest and enjoy the holiday season with my family. I can’t wait to actually do Christmasy things with my own children.
Happy Teaching,
Iram