Winter Holidays, Day Four

Today is stocking day. I have tried making felt stockings with my students and having them glue two sides together, but without much success. The glue just soaks into the felt and they fall apart….so I just cut them out of paper now. So….you will need a stocking pattern for each student. I would recommend having each student choose his/her stocking color before you make the patterns so that you are sure that you have enough of each color. If you are feeling adventurous, you can provide two patterns per child and have them glue them together (or if you have very dexterous students…..you can punch small holes and have them “sew” the stocking sides together using embroidery thread….but I have never been that brave!). Anyway…..

Have your students cut their stockings out and decorate. I love the idea of each student having a stocking with his/her name on it, so let each child put their name on the stocking however they can, whether they can actually write their name, if they can trace it with a writing utensil or glittery or colored glue, or whether they need to use paper or foam letters to make their name….what matters is that everyone gets his or her name on a stocking! Other than that, the sky’s the limit! Provide lots of paper in different colors and textures, yarn, buttons, jewels, colored or glitter glue, cloth scraps-WHATEVER. Let everyone decorate their stocking however they want! Once they have dried, you could hang them around your door or make a cute mock fireplace to hang them around.

For fine motor, make baking dough. Use your favorite recipe, or if you don’t have one, you could use this one. Let each child knead and roll out a ball of dough and cut it into a Christmas-y shape with a cookie cutter. Then, of course, you will want to put each child’s creation on a square of waxed paper with his/her name or initials on it and bake it! You will paint them tomorrow.

Since this time of year is one that we so often associate with different types of scents, this is a great time to use things with a nice scent in your sensory table. You could simply put bags of cinnamon potpourri, or you could buy cinnamon-scented pinecones and bury them in red and green shredded paper.