Holiday Celebrations in Kindergarten
Every year I enjoy spending December with my students learning about holidays and holiday traditions around the world. While the holiday season felt shortened this year because Thanksgiving was so late in November, in Kindergarten A we did our best to make our Labs time into a bonus Social Studies time, traveling to different places around the world to learn more and make holiday cheer.
“Every year I enjoy spending December with my students learning about holidays and holiday traditions around the world. “
We began with a discussion of our own traditions for the holiday season and about Kwanzaa. In order to teach about the holidays I use a mix of literature and online videos and websites to help students more deeply understand the traditions of others. We read Kevin’s Kwanzaa by Lisa Bullard which was enjoyed immensely by my crew. After that we made our own Kinaras out of paper.
“After that we made our own Kinaras out of paper.”
The next place we travelled to was the Philippines! It is really awesome to show videos of holiday decorations in the Philippines because they really make sure everything is decorated and lit up. One of the traditional decorations from the Philippines is called a parol star lantern and this is a great item to analyze in Kindergarten because we were just wrapping up a unit all about 2-Dimensional shapes. The lanterns have many geometric shapes that students can identify while we create our own. You can find a star, triangles and a pentagon inside one. We could also revisit this when we learn about 3-Dimensional shapes because the lanterns are 3-Dimensional (ours were 2D).
The biggest hit of the holidays I think was when we traveled to Mexico to learn about Mexican celebrations by learning about Las Posadas and La Nochebuena. While we enjoyed making our own poinsettias, the most joy and fun was when we discussed the musical connections and I played “Feliz Navidad” by Jose Feliciano for the crew. The immediate singing along and dancing that happened was a joyful noise indeed! Jose Feliciano’s words certainly became an earworm and stuck in all of our heads as we worked on our scrapbook pages and crafts. Then we followed it up by making our own shoes as they put out shoes in the Netherlands instead of stockings. Here are some of our created shoes on display!
To round it all off, I have my own tradition that each day before winter break I have my classes make their own very simple craft of a pipe cleaner and bead candy cane ornament. This allows them to make their own pattern and unique candy cane as well as a keepsake to bring home. I think my own teachers did this same craft with me as a student and we definitely held onto the candy cane for a long time in the Bonaparte household. If you’re reading this, I hope you had a wonderful holiday season however you celebrate! It’s awesome to appreciate your own traditions and maybe take time to learn about someone else’s and participate with respect. Happy New Year!