Holiday activities and decorations for the classroom

Your students are getting excited about holiday break and quite honestly, so are you! It’s best to embrace the cheer and find ways to make fun holiday activities and decorations educational. Here’s a list to get your inspired along with some tips on how to make the decorations or activities tie in with what you are teaching.

Class Activities

STEM Advent Calendar

This twist on an advent calendar is a creative way to get your students excited about STEM. Each day has a STEM activity that is holiday themed such as the Christmas Catapult, disappearing candy cane lines, or cookie science. Get the STEM holiday activities and template by clicking here.

Kindness Calendar

This Random Acts of Kindess Calendar is a great month-long activity for all ages. Encourage students to participate in each day’s act of kindness by making it part of your lesson. Or, create a point system where students with the highest scores from completing the most activities receive a reward at the end of the calendar. Get a download of this calendar by clicking here.

Writing Prompts

Timely writing prompts are a great activity for all ages while also helping students feel confident in exploring their creativity and writing skills. Check out these 20 writing prompts for the holiday season by clicking here.

Sight Word Cookies

These sight word cookies are a great activity for younger students so they can practice their new reading skills and also learn team work skills with classmates. [source]

Holiday Bingo

Holiday Bingo is a great game to play with students, but could also be turned into a quiz game. Instead of using the dice, draw students’ name out of a hat or bowl one at a time and give them a quiz question over material recently covered. If they get the question right, let them pick what symbol on the bingo boards get marked! [source]

Door Decorating

Charlie Brown and Snoopy

A Charlie Brown theme can be great for all ages! It’s especially fitting for music teachers who want to teach their students songs from the classic A Charlie Brown Christmas movie. [source]

Penguin

This adorable penguin and igloo combination can connect well with lessons discussing biomes or climate. [source]

Snowman

This holly jolly snowman is a simple but seasonal door decoration. Making the snowman out of used plastic or Styrofoam cups is a great way to start a conversations with students about recycling. [source]

Gingerbread House

This gingerbread house is a great door choice for making students feel welcome in class. This decoration could be tied into nutrition lessons or chemistry classes when discussing changes in state (like lollipops experience when being made). [source]

Classroom Decor

Light Garland

This simple garland is a great way to add color and decoration in your classroom without creating too much of a distraction for students. Click here for the tutorial.

Kindness Garland

This decoration also doubles an a classroom activity! These holiday lights ask students how they can light up the world with kindness and provide space for them to develop an answer. Once the activity is over, hang these up in class as a decoration and a reminder for students. Get the download for this activity and a “The Gift of Kindness” activity by clicking here.

Gifts for Students

Candy Cane Trees

Use green felt to create a tiny holiday tree and decorate it as you wish. Then, cut slits into the felt and weave a candy cane through the slits so the tree becomes a candy cane holder or an ornament. [source]

Reindeer Lollipops

These Rudolph lollipops are a simple way to show students you care as they leave your classroom for holiday break. Check out the tutorial by clicking here.