CCP: Episode 46 // Christmas Survival Tips for the Classroom
It’s that crazy time of year!
Holiday crazed kids, trying to keep your students focused, and a million things to do inside AND outside the classroom — all while maintaining your sanity (if that’s even possible!)
Good News! I am here to help you feel less stressed and more prepared for the hectic weeks ahead. Although your to-do list is likely a mile long, you don’t have to feel like your spinning 10 plates in the air. In this week’s episode, I’m sharing some helpful tips and tricks to not just help you SURVIVE the holidays in the classroom, but rather THRIVE during this crazy time, (and maybe even sneak in some time for yourself?)
And guess what? You don’t even have to take notes. All the links and resources I mention are listed below in the show notes. I consider that a holiday win!
You’ll Learn
(Timestamps Shown)
How to keep your sanity during the holidays (it IS possible!) (1:03)
Simple ways to be less stressed and and more prepared (1:56)
Where to grab FREE holiday resources available to you to save you oodles of time! (12 freebies to be exact!) (2:47)
Easy hacks to keep students learning and engaged (4:14)
How to take normal teaching tools and give them holiday flare (6:23)
Easy decorations for your classroom…with help from your students (7:54)
How to keep students motivated (10:12)
Inexpensive student gift ideas for the holidays (11:23)
An activity to use when you return after the long break (14:19)
LINKS & RESOURCES MENTIONED IN THE EPISOD
Online Resources for Christmas Around the World:
Christmas Around the World LINKtivity
Video Tutorial: DIY Pennant Banners for Any Occasion
“Christmas Around the World” Flip book
Holiday Theme Pennant Banners
Reindeer Rewards
& more!
Take-home Math and Science Kits (Perfect for student holiday gifts!)
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TRANSCRIPT
Ep 46: Christmas Survival Tips for the Classroom transcript powered by Sonix—easily convert your audio to text with Sonix.
Ep 46: Christmas Survival Tips for the Classroom was automatically transcribed by Sonix with the latest audio-to-text algorithms. This transcript may contain errors. Sonix is the best audio automated transcription service in 2020. Our automated transcription algorithms works with many of the popular audio file formats.
Hey, teachers, if you have a classroom and a commute, you're in the right place. I'm your host, Rachael, and I want to ride along with you each week on your ride into school. This podcast is the place for busy teachers who want actionable tips, simple strategies, and just want to enjoy their job more. Let's go.
Hello and welcome to another episode of The Classroom Commute Podcast. Hope you're having a wonderful day whenever you are listening to this. At the time of this recording, we are days away from turning the calendar over to December. It's really hard to believe that we have made it this far in 2020 with everything that's gone on. It feels good to kind of reach that last month of the year, even though it doesn't really mean anything specific is going to change the second we go from December 31st to January 1st, but it's a mental thing. It makes us feel a little bit better. I also remember that those weeks between Thanksgiving and Christmas in the classroom can be very overwhelming. You are desperately trying to keep those holiday crazed kids focused and learning to maintain your sanity both inside and outside of the classroom. Even though the year is winding down, your to do list is likely ramping up. You likely have shopping to do, holiday parties to attend, and papers to grade before you can leave for the long winter break, if that's what you are doing. There are a hundred other things that I am sure you are trying to check off your to do list. I know that you want to incorporate all those holiday fun activities into your classroom, but you barely have time to eat during this time, let alone plan holiday activities for your students. Take a deep breath and as we enter this crazy time of the year.
I'm going to help you feel a little less stressed and more prepared for the hectic weeks ahead. Before I dive into all things holiday related for the classroom, I want to tell you that this week is going to be really important that you head over to the show notes, because I'm going to be talking about a lot of things that I will link to in the show notes. I want to make sure that you get your hands on all of them. I've got lots of freebies, resources, and websites that I'm going to link to. I want to make sure that you get all of that so you don't have to take any notes in this episode. Just head over to classroomnook.com/podcast/46 to get all of the links and resources that I'm talking about today in today's episode. All right, let's get at it. These are my top tips for surviving the holidays in your classroom.
My first survival tip is simple. Don't create it if somebody else already has. My first step is to collect tons of freebies. Yes, there are tons of holiday freebies out there for you and 'already done for you' resources to save you time and energy this month. This is especially helpful this time of the year when you're already trying to fit in all the extra stuff, both personally and professionally. If somebody has already done the work for you, just sit back and take more time for yourself. Speaking of, I have 12 Christmas freebies over in our Members Resource Library. If you are already a member, maybe you've scrolled past them a time or two. Well, now is the time to download them to your computer and use them in your classroom. If you're not a member, head over to the show notes, where I link to the Members Resource Library so you can get your hands on them. We're talking about things like Candy Cane Arrays, where students can practice arrays with a fun candy cane twist. Editing Elves and Fraction Bump-It with a holiday theme. I've got games for nouns, verbs, adjectives, idioms, and so much more. Make sure you head over to the show notes and grab all of those freebies and use them in your centers. Easy peasy. Tip number one, if it's already done for you, don't do it yourself. Go ahead, get on Pinterest. Allow yourself to download all the freebies that they have and definitely head over to the show notes and grab the link to the Members Resource Library on my website for those 12 Christmas freebies as well.
All right, survival tip number two. Here's an idea for how to keep students learning and engaged, even though they may be a little holiday crazed this time of year. One activity that I did always around this time of year was my Christmas Around the World research project. This popular activity was always a huge hit in my classroom. It was the perfect way to sneak in some research and skill practice. I had my student pick one country from a selected list that I would give them and they would research ways that that country celebrated Christmas. The students would research online, use books in our classroom and school libraries, and then they would compile it in a flip book that would make a great display in our classroom. This is an easy activity to do, both in the classroom or at home, if your students are learning from home this year because they can access pretty much anything that they would need to know about a country and how it celebrates Christmas online. Now, I created a flip book that is included in my Christmas survival kit on teachers pay teachers and I will link to that in the show notes. I will also link, in the show notes, to some online resources that you can pass on to your students to help them do some research as well. Whether or not you use my flip book or one of your own, these resources will be great for researching online. Also, since I've left the classroom, I've developed another resource called Christmas around the World LINKtivity, where all the work is done right there in the activity. They do all the research right there where they click on several different countries and they explore things like holiday traditions and foods that they eat. They see pictures of what the holidays look like in that country. It's a super interactive way for them to explore around the world and how Christmas is celebrated. They create this really cool looking lab book where they record all the information that they've learned about the country in their lab book. It makes a great final project, again, a great display in the classroom or just for them to have at home if they're not in the classroom. I will link to that Christmas Around the World LINKtivity in the show notes as well, if that's a little bit more your style. All the work is done for you, you don't have to assign them any online resources. Everything is right there for them.
My next step for surviving the holidays in the classroom is super simple. One of the easiest ways to incorporate a little holiday fun into your classroom is to take your normal teaching tools, things like math manipulative and game pieces and give them a little holiday makeover. This allows you to teach the same content that you were planning on teaching in the first place, but make it a little bit more special for this time of the year. Just simply put holiday clip art on your graphic organizers or your writing templates or anything else that you may be using in the classroom and still have them complete the same activity. They'll have that little holiday flair to look at as well. For the games that you have your students play, you can swap out your normal moving pieces and replace them with those cute little holiday erasers. You know, the kind that you usually find in the Target dollar bin around this time of year. Little things like that can make all the difference. Inside my Christmas survival kit on Teachers Pay Teachers, I have a variety of graphic organizers, game pieces, and things like that that you can just print out and use right away. Of course, I will link to that resource in the show notes.
All right. My next tip is about making your classroom look inviting for the holiday season. Now, if you're like me, you like the idea of a festively decorated classroom for the holiday season, but don't like the work that comes with it. That's why easy decorations that can go up in just a few minutes, but add a lot of sparkle are my kind of holiday decorations. There are two holiday decorations that always would make an appearance in my classroom. The first staple was my Holiday Theme Pennant Banners. You can use these over your door, over your smart board as little corner pieces to your bulletin boards. You can put them anywhere. And guess what? They are so easy to make using PowerPoint or another program that you might use on your computer. I will link to a video tutorial that I made about how to make these in PowerPoint for your classroom. You can use any background that you want or things that you may already have on your computer. Make sure you check out that video tutorial over in the show notes at classroomnook.com/podcast/46 and I will show you just how easy it is to make them. Like I said, they are an instant pop of holiday over your door, bulletin boards, whiteboards or anywhere else where you want to add a little extra sparkle. The second decoration that I would use was made possible with a little help from my students, and it was a Christmas Lights Writing Activity. The best part is that the students did the majority of the work. You can use it with any writing assignment. The only thing that you'll need is a writing template that looks like it's in the shape of a Christmas light. Just choose any clipart that looks like a Christmas light. You know, those kinds that you string up on your house and make it so that it's large enough to fill an entire paper and put some lines in it. I also have this template as part of my Holiday Survival Kit, which again, I'll link to in the show notes. You can use any clipart that you want. If you want to create this on your own, then you'll want to copy the template on a variety of colors that you would normally see in Christmas lights. Reds, greens, yellows, blues and all those beautiful holiday colors that we see strung on a Christmas light string. Then when your students are working on their writing piece, when they're ready to write their final copy, you'll have them do it on the Christmas light template. When they're done, they can cut it out, and then you'll take all the lights to put together on a string to hang up somewhere in your classroom. You can do this on a really long blank wall in your classroom or even in your hallway. Just use a long string and every few inches or so staple one of your students Christmas lights writing piece to the string so that it looks like they are strung up like Christmas lights. I suggest doing this activity early on in the month so that you'll have this decoration up all month long and enjoy it with your students. It doubles as a Christmas decoration in your classroom or hallway.
All right, my next tip is for how to keep students motivated during this crazy time. It never fails. From Halloween on, students enter into some sort of alter ego that changes them into crazed, tiny humans. It starts with the sugar high from the Halloween candy, and it doesn't end until the holidays are over. Student motivation can be at an all time low. Luckily, it often doesn't take much more than a little holiday magic to bring them back on track. Something simple like reindeer rewards with no cost to you. Incentives can hold their attention just long enough until the bell rings on the day before Christmas break. After that, it's their parents problem. These reindeer rewards could be really simple things like, they get an opportunity to sit at the teacher's desk for an afternoon or they get to eat lunch in the classroom with the friend. Or if you're at home learning, you get to have a special Zoom with them, a friend, and you or you can use a free homework, pass or choose a class game. All sorts of no cost rewards that your students can pick from will keep those kiddos focused until the bitter end. You can use those rewards that you know your students are going to love, or you can grab my set of Reindeer Rewards inside my Holiday Survival Kit in the show notes.
This next survival tip is all about creating student holiday gifts. I was always on the hunt for a Christmas gift for my students that A. didn't cost me a lot of money and B. was something that my students actually wanted. I would cringe every time I'd give my students a gift, only to find it in bits and pieces on the floor after they left for holiday break. I finally came up with a gift that didn't cost me a lot of money, and it was something that students couldn't wait to bring home. I created two different take home kits. One was for math games and the other was a science kit of experiments for them to complete at home. I would use one of these gifts for a holiday gift and then I would save the other one for a gift to give to my students at the end of the school year. P.S., parents love these two because it gives them something to do over the long break. Here's what's inside. Inside the math kit were 10 different games, all of the materials that they would need, and the game pieces that they would need to play those games. All of the materials were printable so I didn't need to go out and buy a class set of dice or a class set of anything else. They were easy to print and students could assemble them at home, or I could cut them out ahead of time and put them in the little baggie. There was a money cootie catcher in there, a paper dice that they could assemble at home, a set of digit cards that they use for a variety of games. So easy to put together. You just put them all in a quart size baggie, zip it up, I put a cute little bag topper on top, stapled it and that was it. I would spend one night sitting in front of the fire, watching a fun Christmas movie and put these together for my students. It was easy and students loved it and I got rave reviews from parents. The other take home kit that I put together was five science experiments that students could complete at home. The experiments used common materials that I could easily find that cost very little money, things like cotton swabs, balloons, pipe cleaners, and a piece of string. Then there was a parent letter that went in there for additional materials that they would need to provide at home, things like dish soap and milk, things that obviously couldn't go in the bag but were needed for the science experiment. I never had any parent complain that they needed those extra things because they were things that they already had in their house anyway. For both the math kit and the science kit, it came with a set of directions so that everything was easy for the students to do at home and parents could help them as well. If you want to see what my math and science kit look like, I will link to them in the show notes and you can grab them if you want, or you can use it as inspiration to create your own gift bag. Oh, and P.S., if you already have a holiday gift that you like to provide for your students, these also make great birthday gifts or student of the month gifts or any other time that you want to celebrate student learning. These are great to give to your students.
All right. Let's wrap this up with one last survival tip. And this one is actually not for how to survive in the classroom during December. It's actually a tip for how to create a stress free return in the new year. One little thing that I learned to do during this crazy time before I left for the holiday break was to prepare at least one or two activities for my students to complete when they returned after the long break. I wanted these activities to be simple for both me and my students while our brains were still warming back up from returning after a long hiatus. One of the activities was a simple goals sheet. I had my students complete the sheet to kind of outline their hopes and goals for the year. They would list books that they wanted to read, things that they wanted to improve on, something new that they wanted to learn, and school/personal goals that they wanted to reach. It was just a nice way to start the New Year off. Along the same lines, I would do a New Year's scoot that kind of asked a lot of the same questions, but it was a little bit more interactive. So you're likely familiar with the game "Scoot" but if you're not, it's really simple. It's just a set of cards with different questions on them. The students each get a card and a recording sheet. Then you set a timer and they get maybe one minute to answer the question on their card and write that answer down on the recording sheet and then they quickly pass their card to the next student while they receive a new card from another student next to them. You would continue to do this until they've gotten all cards and their recording sheet is complete. For my New Year's scoot, I ask questions like what's one book that you want to read? What's one subject you want to improve on? What was the greatest accomplishment of last year? What is one behavior goal you would like to work on this year? Reading goals? Things like that, to make getting into the New Year a little more interactive and fun for your students. If you want to grab this New Year's scoot, it's free in our Members Resource Library over at the show notes. I will link to that so you can grab that New Year's scoot and you already have one activity ready to go for when you return in the new year.
All right, so there you have it. The holidays in the classroom do not have to be super stressful. I hope that these survival tips will help you more than just survive, but rather thrive during this crazy time. Again, make sure you head over to the show notes for everything that I've mentioned. I knew I threw a lot of resources and links out at you, but you don't have to worry because they're all over there in the show notes.
One last thing before you go, if you have a moment to rate and review this podcast, I would be super appreciative of that to help grow this teacher community and let more teachers know about the podcast. All right. I hope you guys have a great rest of your day. I will be back again next week with another episode. Bye for now.
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