Christmas activities for preschoolers: games, crafts, songs, books and a week plan

These 18 Christmas activities cover the class party, simple crafts, gingerbread, sensory play, math and science. They’re for 3 to 5 year olds, and most suit kindergarten too.

You’ll also find six picture books and three songs set to familiar tunes. Use the five day plan to put the week together. If some families don’t celebrate Christmas, there’s a section for your room too.

Christmas games for preschoolers

December is loud. Give that energy somewhere to go with games that each fit in ten minutes. Pick three or four for the class party.

1. Pin the nose on the reindeer

Draw a big reindeer face on butcher paper and tape it to the wall. Give each child a red pom pom with a loop of tape on the back. With their eyes closed, they take three steps and stick the nose on. Skip the blindfold for three year olds. Closed eyes are scary enough.

2. Where’s the jingle?

Everyone sits in a circle with their eyes closed. Hand a jingle bell shaker to one child, who shakes it once and hides it behind their back. Once the class opens their eyes, they guess who has the bell. The guesser takes the next turn.

3. Snowball toss

Crumpled white paper or rolled up socks make the snowballs. Put a bucket or laundry basket a few steps away. Each child throws five, and you count the ones that go in together. Move the bucket back for the older children.

4. Melting snowman freeze dance

Play a Christmas song from your own device and put the melting snowman on the Christmas timer for three minutes. Children dance while the music plays and freeze when it stops. The game ends when the snowman is a puddle. They’ll ask for another.

5. Pass the present

Wrap a small box in five or six layers of paper, with a sheet of stickers in the middle. Pass it round the circle while the music plays. When it stops, the child holding it tears off one layer. The child who opens the last layer hands out stickers to everyone. Nobody loses.

6. Reindeer, reindeer, Santa

Play it like duck, duck, goose. The child walking round taps heads and says “reindeer, reindeer,” then “Santa!” Santa chases them round the circle back to the gap. Use the spin the wheel name picker to choose who walks first so the same hands don’t always go up.

Christmas crafts for preschoolers

Have paper and glue ready, along with a few cotton balls. You won’t need to cut out thirty of anything the night before.

7. Handprint reindeer

Trace the child’s two hands on brown paper and cut them out. They become antlers. Glue them to the top of a brown paper head. Add googly eyes and a red pom pom nose. Write the child’s name and the year on the back.

8. Paper plate Santa

Cut a paper plate in half. Children color the top half red for the hat and glue cotton balls on the bottom half for the beard. Add a pink paper circle for the face. Every child pulls the cotton balls into small pieces before gluing them. That’s good fine motor work.

9. Jingle bell shakers

Thread three jingle bells onto a pipe cleaner and twist the ends together into a loop. Children shake them for the songs below. Jingle bells are small enough to be a choking risk, so make these with an adult at the table and keep them away from anyone who still mouths things.

10. Salt dough ornaments

Mix 1 cup of flour, half a cup of salt and half a cup of water into a dough. Children roll it out and press in cookie cutters. Make a hole at the top with a straw. Bake at 250°F for two to three hours, until hard. Leave the painting for the next day. These make good gifts for families. For ideas for the teacher, see gifts for preschool and daycare teachers.

11. A paper chain countdown

Make a paper chain with one link for every school day left before winter break. Each morning, a different child tears off a link. The Christmas timer page also shows how many days are left until Christmas, if the class wants to check.

Gingerbread man activities for preschool

12. The gingerbread hunt

Read Gingerbread Baby in the morning, then tell the class the gingerbread man ran off while they were reading. Leave paper clues in the office and kitchen, with another in the playground. Each clue leads to the next. The last clue is back in the classroom with a plate of gingerbread cookies, if your program allows food.

13. Gingerbread playdough

Add a tablespoon each of cinnamon and ground ginger to your usual playdough with a little brown food coloring. Put out gingerbread cutters and rolling pins, with buttons for eyes. The room smells like a bakery for a week.

A Christmas sensory bin

14. A snow bin

Mix 2 cups of baking soda with about a third of a cup of white hair conditioner. It turns into cold, soft snow that holds a shape. Add scoops and shatterproof ornaments. Put in small plastic reindeer to bury too. Children who mouth things need a closer eye, or swap in shredded white paper.

15. A wrapping station

Fill a box with paper scraps and small empty boxes, along with child safe tape. Children wrap and tape their boxes, then unwrap them, for as long as you’ll let them. It’s fine motor practice that nobody has to be talked into.

Math and science

16. Ornament patterns

Start with shatterproof ornaments in two colors. After sorting them by color and then by size, children lay out a pattern on a paper tree: red, gold, red, gold. Four year olds can try three colors.

17. Why does salt melt ice?

Put two ice cubes on two plates and sprinkle salt on one. Ask the class which will melt first. Then watch. The salted cube melts faster and gets little holes in it. Run the Christmas timer on the snowman for ten minutes and compare the cubes with the snowman.

18. Candy canes in warm and cold water

Drop a candy cane into a cup of warm water and another into a cup of cold water. Children love checking on the candy canes every few minutes. The one in warm water loses its stripes and goes soft much faster because sugar dissolves faster in warm water. That’s the whole lesson.

Christmas books for preschoolers

Six books for December: two about gingerbread and snow, plus two funny Christmas stories. The other two are classics children may already know. The Mitten and Snowmen at Night work for any family, Christmas or not.

Bear Stays Up for Christmas is the one to read on the last day before break. Bear’s friends fall asleep, so he wraps a present for each of them.

Christmas songs for preschoolers

Hand out the jingle bell shakers first. These songs put new words to tunes the children already know, so they can sing along on day one.

Jingle, jingle, little bell (to the tune of Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star)

Jingle, jingle, little bell, ring so everyone can tell. Shake it high and shake it low, shake it fast and shake it slow. Jingle, jingle, little bell, now the bells can rest a spell.

The reindeer on the roof (to the tune of The Wheels on the Bus)

The reindeer on the roof go tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap. The reindeer on the roof go tap, tap, tap, all through the night. Next verses: the bells on the sleigh go jingle, the presents go under the tree, and everybody whispers shh.

Here we go round the Christmas tree (to the tune of Here We Go Round the Mulberry Bush)

Here we go round the Christmas tree, the Christmas tree, the Christmas tree. Here we go round the Christmas tree, so early in the morning. Then act out each verse: this is the way we hang the star, wrap the presents and go to sleep.

When not every family celebrates Christmas

Most classrooms have a few families who celebrate Hanukkah, Kwanzaa or nothing at all in December. Ask families at the start of December what they celebrate. Invite anyone who wants to share a song or story, or bring food. Keep a winter theme running alongside. Snow, mittens, ice and snowmen belong to everyone, and half the activities above work without a word about Christmas. The Mitten and Snowmen at Night carry a winter week on their own.

A Christmas week plan you can copy

Many schools break for winter in the third week of December, so plan this for the week before the party.

• Monday: start the paper chain countdown. Handprint reindeer at the art table. Read The Mitten.
• Tuesday: snow sensory bin opens. Ornament patterns at the math table. Learn Jingle, jingle, little bell.
• Wednesday: read Gingerbread Baby, then the gingerbread hunt. Gingerbread playdough all afternoon.
• Thursday: salt and ice at the science table. Make jingle bell shakers. Paper plate Santas.
• Friday: the class party. Play pin the nose on the reindeer and pass the present. Then a melting snowman freeze dance. Read Bear Stays Up for Christmas at the end.

For a printable grid, open the free preschool lesson plan template and pick the weekly layout. For the party, print a name tag for every child with the name tag maker.

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