Christmas Activities For Toddlers

[sue073]

Hi all hope your all enjoying your weekend.
ok im a group leader with young todders 15 month to 3 year
i have been ask to get our christmas ideas in early so the director can put her order in on the 1st Nov 2011 which yes is this tuesday
we have only just found this out on monday night staff meeting yay forthe short notice for us...lol
so now its sunday and im thinking i only have 2 days to think of some good ideas. im now at the group leader role so my creative side is sort of on hold while i get my head around the programming side of it all... my assistant is away for the next week so that leaves it all up to my brain. so this is where is ask you guys.
ideas please your past experiences/christmas ideas
PLEASE HELP
Sue

[Lorina]

Hi Suz,

It's Monday night... have you got any ideas yet?? LOL... I know exactly how frustrating it can be trying to think of Christmassy craft to do. I'm actually trying to figure it out for my group of children... Here are a few ideas I'm thinking of doing...

- Christmas tree ornament baubles with child's name on it. I'll probably by plain coloured Christmas baubles, use pva glue to write child's name on it and then the child can sprinkle glitter on the glue to create their name.

- Pom pom xmas tree. Cut out small xmas trees from green felt. Child can decorate using green pom poms on top. I would also provide small coloured pom poms for lights.

- Santas hat. Cut out a red triangle. Child can stick a cotton ball on the point (as the top of santas hat) and use cotton balls to make 2 rows t(for the bottom of santas hat).

- Felt Stocking. For each child, cut out from red felt a shape of a xmas stocking. Also cut a white strip and add it to the top of the stocking (to form santas boot). On the white strip use glitter glue to write child's name. On the red bit have the child use glitter pens to decorate it.

These crafts are pretty simple to do and the ones I liked so far!

If you need a shopping list for craft here are some things that will be ideal: paper plates (for Santa masks etc), paper cups (create reindeer's), paper bags, pom pom balls, felt pieces in green and red (1 of each colour for each child), glitter glue, xmas balls, xmas shape cutters, googly eyes, pipe cleaners...if you have all these materials available you can definitely come up with something!

Let me know how it goes and I'll keep adding more ideas as I do them!!

Cheers ,
L.A

[sandi28]

Hi Sue, This may be too late, however, here is a link where you can get free printables and downloads using cheap/easy materials you probably have on hand. http://www.dltk-holidays.com/xmas/crafts.html

[catchmeifucan]

Good Ideas

I can’t believe it’s nearly xmas. I think there are only like 7 weeks to go! I want to try and make a “MERRY CHRISTMAS” sign out of each child’s handprints. So for each shape of the letter will be handprints. Don’t know how well it’s gonna turn out but I’m giving it a go…

[teresamc]

They are very focused on covering the walls with Christmas stuff where I am and I have to question the educational value of that. It is too late for this year but things will be different next year.
So in our Christmas crafting frenzy we have done:

• flat coloured bauble with upper case letters for child's initial and glitter
  Reindeers made from a foot print for the ace and two handprints for the antlers
  Santa boots with stitching around the outside in fuzzy white yarn
  Christmas trees cut out from old green suspension files and painted/decorated
  large Santa that was a group project - I made a smaller one and took photos of each step in the process, put them on display, drew the outline of a much bigger one and provided children with materials so they could follow the "procedure."

There have also been painted candy canes, angels with wings from coloured shiny paper and stars with paint and glitter but these were just "wall fillers" as far as I was concerned.

[jrw60]

How is everyone going with Christmas and EYLF? Personally finding no real differences except for the documentation side of things, lots of intentional teaching, children's choices and enthusiasm!

What are you doing for Christmas this year? Plan so far:

-making wrapping paper using brown paper roll and cookie cutters with red, green & yellow paint - stars, trees, santa etc
-parent's gift is a calendar from discount shop ($1 each) with whiteboard attached, which the children drew on with permanent markers - interesting to see what they came up with, looks great!
-Children's gifts are Christmas books with CD's I got for free through Scholastic Book Club orders this year.
-cooking - making trees with upturned ice cream cone, green icing and sprinkles etc. Also doing reindeer cupcakes with antlers made from cut up pretzels, santa bikkies using arrowroot biscuits, icing, marshmallows.
-portfolios to finish off with learning stories, artwork etc, also do photo cd's for parents from this year.
-Role play wrapping presents, Christmas songs and stories, making decorations for our FDC tree.
-Variety of other sparkly art & crafts available for the children's choices.
-scheme does a celebration with Santa at a local park, which I won't be here for this year.

Ho Ho Ho!!! Phew!! No wonder I need a holiday!!

[Lorina]

Well it's a year later and it's that time of year again when we are getting ready to take a break from work and enjoy spending time with friends and family over the christmas period.

Just wanted to find out what some of your christmas/end of year gifts were to families this year?

It's always a good idea to share what we have done, maybe you have an idea that no one has though of??

Love to hear your creativeness!

,
L.A

[daddymarkus]

October is upon us and Christmas is almost around the corner again. Time to resurrect this thread again, huh?

Anyway, my favorite activity during this season is to put up the decorations, lights, and everything else. I usually go for homemade decors for the home and when we hold parties. For other party items though, I just purchase from PartiesOnline website.

I'm quite excited for the holidays! Looking forward to taking a family photo with a local Santa. It's become quite a yearly tradition for our family.

[Elianaa]

My favourite activity I've seen done for christmas is making reindeer food! We dye rice in both red and green with the children, then when it's dry we mix it with oats and glitter and cachous. The kids really enjoy this. Then we put it in a bag and attatched a laminated tag with the child's name, they take it home and sprinkle it on the front lawn for the reindeers to eat!