Need a Lesson for Any Holiday?

Are you in a pinch for a holiday lesson…ANY TIME of the year? Do this! This turned out better than I thought and into an amazing critical thinking activity!

STEP 1. Brainstorm a list of holidays as a whole group. Take any holiday the children tell you and write them on the board/ELMO etc. I even had a child tell me Veterans Day. After which ensued a discussion about what Veterans Day is about. Surprisingly to me, I discovered that Veterans Day is about being thankful to veterinarians. 😀 After we cleared that up, we started on the next step.

STEP 2: Pick two holidays you would like to squish (combine) into a new, original, holiday. I used the example of Christmas + Thanksgiving in one class because I knew children would gravitate to holidays that were close to November and December on the calendar. I emphasized being original after I used Thanksgiving and Christmas as the examples..

STEP 3: Think of three details about each of your squished holidays. For example, what type of activities would people do for a celebration? What type of songs would be sung? What type of decorations would there be? What type of foods would be eaten? I have children list at least three details for each of their created holidays. I asked students to create three squished holidays.

STEP 4: Draw a picture of your favorite squished holiday. Children want to do this anyway while they are thinking of the holiday.

STEP 5: Have children show their work on the Elmo or do a gallery walk. They will be proud of their newly created holiday!