Good Day to You My Little Tree Enthusiast!
One of my favorite parts of Christmas is most definitely the Christmas tree, and these Christmas tree games will add to that joy! I love the lights, the garland, the smell(if yours is real), and naturally the bright shiny gifts underneath. So why not come up with some educational stuff to go with the tree, right? Here is a list of awesome activities for around your Christmas tree.
We begin with the tree
Of course you can’t have Christmas tree games without a tree! I am a huge fan of encouraging students to do as much as possible themselves. This is a great opportunity for learning, expression, and of course means less prep for you. Sweet! Below are some fun, easy tree ideas that involve process art(my favorite kind!)
Triangle Tree– You have to scroll to the bottom with this one. Such a great idea because it uses a shape, too. You can talk about properties of a triangle, and the tree is a tessellation(if you want to go that far). Math…check! Art…check!
Paper Plate Tree– Same idea only with circles, and the tree is not a tessellation. But, you can still talk about properties of a circle.
Mitten Tree– Ok this last one isn’t artsy, but it’s a great way for your students to help others. Use the idea pictured in the link, only it would be strings with clothespins attached. Have each student bring in a pair of new or gently used mittens/gloves to clip onto the tree.
There are of course, a ton more ideas, so have fun with it!
Christmas Tree Games
We begin with the gift hunt
Students write the answer to a given question on a gift tag and place it on their gift. Afterward, they hide their gifts and give their cards to someone else in the class. Once each student has a card, they have to find their gift with the correct answer on the gift tag and place it under the tree. See how fast they can do it as a class.
Benefits: You can see that the student hiding the gift knows the correct answer and the student finding it has the correct answer. Encourage them to help one another find their gifts!
Non-holiday Winter themes could be snow boxes or ice cubes and they can create an igloo with them!
Where do the questions come from? An appropriate inquiry. Here’s where you get to tailor the activity to your needs.
For Language Arts: you can use our Brain Bounce cards, or other quiz cards to practice vocabulary.
For Math: any Scoot game would work great. Or, if you have flash cards, task cards, etc. those work well also. I’ve listed some of our seasonal options below:
Ornament Fun
My inspiration for this came from mpmideas.com. Make ornaments for the tree. You can have your students decorate them or you can just whip them up. Use light colors because the students will be writing on them. After they are laminated, put them on the tree.
Ornament word families– Start by choosing a word family and tell the students what it is. Have them(either in teams or individually) take turns going up to the tree and writing a word on a blank ornament. The trick is to either fill all the ornaments or not get stumped. If a team/person gets stumped, they’re out and have to wait for the next round. Everyone left standing gets a point. The team or person with the most points wins.
Ornament multiples/factors– This one might be a little more advanced. Choose a number and have students take turns writing its factors or multiples. For example, 25 would have 1, 5, 25 as its factors. Multiples of 5 would be 5, 10, 15, etc. Since these answers are limited, you might want to eliminate the competition aspect and just challenge them to see what they know.
Ornament I Spy– Pick a color and have each student write or draw something that is that color. You can do the same with beginning sounds too!
Anything I missed?
Do you have more ideas to share from your own classroom? Maybe you have a suggestion that would improve on our ideas? Whatever it is, we want to hear it! Comment below or join our Literacy That Clicks and Sticks FB group to share great ideas all the time.
Have a very merry week and I’ll chat with you later!
