I posted this in the kindergarten forum, but I had no response, so I thougt I would try here. December is my favorite time of month. There are so many great art projects and activities that can be done. I thought it would be fun to share our favorite ideas for December. What is your favorite Art project for December? What are your favorite books you read in December? What is your favorite Bulletin Board idea for December? What is your favorite theme for December? (ie: Polar Express) What activities do you do for your favorite theme? What is your favorite activity that you do in December? Feel free to give other ideas too. I will start. Art project- Marble painting candy canes- I use a paper candy cane and tape it to paper box lid. then I use red and green paint dip a marble in each color and put it in the box and have the child start rolling the box around. When it is dry I have the kids cut it out. When we are finished we have green and red candy canes. Books I like reading The Gingerbread Baby. Bulletin Board- We draw pictures and label of thing we want for Christmas. We then cover it with wrapping paper, so you can lift it up to see the picture. I put the Title -All WE WANT FOR CHRISTMAS. Theme-Polar Express Theme activity- Pajama Day and watch the movie. Favorite Christmas activity-Family Tree project- We send home paper Trees for the families to decorate together.
What is your favorite Art project for December? Oh, I have so many of them, but my very favorite would be sponge-painting a Christmas tree. My students get a kick out of doing that. What are your favorite books you read in December? Lots of them...I love any of the Gingerbread Boy books and any Nativity books too. What is your favorite Bulletin Board idea for December? My kids make beautiful angels using their hands (wings) and paper doilies (garment). They look so pretty on the bulletin board. What is your favorite theme for December? (ie: Polar Express) It would have to be the Gingerbread Boy. What activities do you do for your favorite theme? We do a drama and make gingerbread cookies, but the kids love making their own gingerbread kids during play-do time. What is your favorite activity that you do in December? We do a classroom re-enactment of the Nativity/Birth of Jesus Night. Great thread! :thumb:
I love doing winter collages. I collect a bunch of materials that seem "wintery" to me. (Basically anything white, silver, light blue, blue, etc. and then cut into small pieces) Some things I've used in the past....straws, foam, tin foil, yarn, string, paper pieces, stickers, art straws, feathers, foamies, cotton balls, gauze pads, q-tips, tissue paper, streamers, tinsil, ribbons, buttons, etc.... AND, of course, GLITTER!!! I put all the supplies out in plates on student tables with bottled glue. Then, I usually set up a glitter station at one of my kidney tables with a parent volunteer to use glitter as a finishing touch. They just look so cool and I leave them up for weeks!! It's nice because it's a pretty open ended project and kids create freely. It's a blast!
What is your favorite Art project for December? Mobile like santa's faces. The kids use string to assemble the santa faces. They look awesome hanging in the room and hall. What are your favorite books you read in December? My class does holiday related Christmas stories in literature circles. My favorite two books to use are: The House without a Christmas Tree and The Best Christmas Pageant Ever. What is your favorite Bulletin Board idea for December? I do a spin off of the"priceless" commercials. My class thinks about all the gifts they could give that are not materialistic. We write our paragraph on gift box shaped paper. On the bulletin board I usually write: iPhone-300.00, Xbox video game- 50.00, a gift from the heart-priceless. What is your favorite theme for December? (ie: Polar Express) I don't really do themes in 5th grade, but doing the holiday literature circles is my favorite. What activities do you do for your favorite theme? With the lit circles, we do different decorations for our lit fair. (the day before break). The first we we focus on story elements-and we make a string of lights-each bulb is a different element. The second week we create an ornament that depicts a picture of the book's setting, and a gingerbread cutout to describe the main character. The third week we retell the story using three parts of an evergreen tree: I cut out a shape of an evergreen, and turn it into three parts. The bottom is the beginning, the middle is the middle of the story and the top is the ending. The lit group decorates their table, and we invite the other 5th grades to come in and browse for some good titles to read over Christmas break! What is your favorite activity that you do in December? See above!
Last year, someone posted a great activity to do with pipe cleaners, borax, and hot water. They shape pipe cleaner into snowflakes, and then put in borax solution to let crystals form. I did it last year and it was AWESOME!!!! Seems like there was something similar using hand soap but I don't remember what.
Last year I saw this idea online about making q-tip snowflakes. I attempted this with my first graders last year and I thought they were so cute but they took a lot of glue and time to dry. Never heard if any of the parents liked them or not. Oh well. This year, I teach Pre-K so my projects are going to be different. Haven't really decided what to do but I love the idea of marble painting candy canes. That is so cute!!! So far we are going to make gingerbread men and have the children "hunt" for them around the school. And we'll make foam gingerbread houses with stickers. Not sure I'm brave enough to try and make 16 gingerbread cookie houses during school! I also had this idea to paint the kids hands red and green (one color per hand) and have them put it on a square of fabric and make a quilt with their handprints to put up in the room after break. I know I love mementos of each class of kids I have.
I'm not the PP, but here's a link I have. I found it when I was doing some research last week. I had it bookmarked it for our Rock and Minerals Unit. Borax Crystals http://www.pallensmith.com/index.php?id=100
wow; that's easy and so nice!! The kids will get a kick out of coming in the morning to see the results of their ornament! Thanks, Alegre!
Stain Glass Pictures I have quite a few Christmas scenes that I copy onto transparencies. The kids color them with bright Sharpie markers. After they dry I put crumpled tin foil behind them and frame them. They are so beautiful and the kids like to give them to their parents for gifts.
That's a great idea! I remember doing something like that in Vacation Bible School years ago. Now I know what we're doing for our Christmas craft! Where did you get the scenes from? Any suggestions on where to look?
I've never done it, but it would be fun to do something with Party/Celebration. I mean Christmas is a Birthday!!!
I do the borax crystal snowflakes with my kids in January. We do a mini study of 'snow' during our unit on polar habitats. In December, my class creates a family traditions cookbook. The kids illustrate. Always turns out lovely and is a great jumping off point for a unit of study in non-fiction writing (how tos, all-about books...)
I did a unit on penguins one year - I used my overhead and traced life size penguins that the kids painted. I have done snowmen too. I liked these because I could leave them up through Jan not just the few weeks in Dec.
The Second grade teacher at my school just got done with a Penguin project. Their last reading story was about penguins. She mixed shaving cream and glue together and let the kids finger-paint with it to make snow. She let it dry and had them make penguins on the picture. The mixture drys puffy. I also use the same mixture in the Spring to make cloud pictures. The kids love it.
My theme from Thanksgiving through Christmas is Family. We do an extended study of our families, including making a family 'tree' that is shaped like a christmas tree with the ornaments depicting family members. The kids like to give these as gifts. I save snow, snowmen (snowpeople) collages and borax snowflakes for January (gives me something to look forward to!) BTW, I like the idea of shaving cream and glue to make snow! I'll have to try that! I also love the cookbook idea! It would go great with family traditions! I am looking for more crafty ideas that the kids could incorporate as gift giving items.
December revolves around The Nutcracker in my room. We read the book, dance to the music, boys will march and the girls have scarves to do a ballet dance, we eat Bon bons, we do a lot of writing with the theme, and then we go watch a professional troupe perform.
