5 FUN (EDUCATIONAL) ACTIVITIES TO DO INSTEAD
I didn’t usually do school in the month of December. At least that is what my boys thought! We did fun things like study about how other countries celebrate the holidays, bake cookies for friends and family, and read Christmas books. Sounds fun right? It was a great way to make special memories and break up the school year without stopping the learning. Here are 5 fun and educational activities you can do with your kids:
- Christmas books – Read them each day. One really fun idea for this, especially for younger kids, is to find 24 books and wrap them all up and put them under the tree. Each day unwrap one and read it together. These books can be old ones passed down from family or even ones from the library. It doesn’t have to be expensive. If your kids are older you could read “A Christmas Carol” by Dickens or some other Christmas book (Christmas Jars by Jason Wright is a good one). You could also tie this into the Icelandic tradition of giving books on Christmas Eve and then spending the night reading!
- Christmas cooking – Did you know that cooking is science? Alton Brown is a great resource to add the science into the lesson that you might not know about. He has a couple of shows on Christmas cookies. HERE is the one he did years ago with regular cookies and you can find a more up to date one (with instructions on how to make gluten-free cookies) HERE. You can also include math by having your kids double or triple the recipe or giving them a budget and figuring out how much each batch costs.
- Being Santa – This is something I tried to do each year. It doesn’t fit nicely into one of the older kids’ core classes but works great for the younger one’s social studies. Find an organization that is looking for donated new gifts and have your kids purchase the gift and donate it. The person for the gift can be a child from a homeless family or an elderly person who might be home alone. If you know of a family that has fallen on hard times you could also do “12 Days of Christmas” for them. One year we did this with some other friends for a family in our community. We developed a theme and for 12 days we took turns taking them gifts for the whole family. They weren’t expensive gifts… mostly homemade, but we showered them with love. This is one of my favorite activities because it brings in the spirit of the season and teaches so much more than just educational standards.
- Play Christmas Games – Did you know that there is an entire philosophy of homeschooling called “Gameschooling”? There are so many different games to play that make learning fun. Don’t discount things like putting together a puzzle with the family. Reading, math, and science are all about seeing patterns and that is what a puzzle is. HERE are some other ideas for Christmas games.
- Christmas Movies – I know, I know. You are probably questioning how movies can be educational but let’s look a little deeper. If you watch a movie and then discuss it as a family it is developing so many deeper thinking and comprehension skills, as well as communication skills. And there are a lot of movies out there that are amazing. Even the ones that I’m not a huge fan of (like “The Grinch”) can have educational value. You could read the book, watch the original cartoon, and then watch the newer movie and compare the storylines. What was different? What was the same? The learning comes in with the discussion (otherwise known as “the debrief”). Here are a few movies that are classics for me and my family:
– It’s A Wonderful Life
– The Man Who Invented Christmas
– Elf
– Miracle on 34th Street
– The Santa Clause movies
– And one I’m going to include this year – Joyeux Noel
I hope you and your family have a wonderful holiday season!