Printable Christmas Activity

I never intended to make this into a post, but after sharing how I used this printable Christmas activity for preschoolers on zoom on Instagram, I immediately got requests. Teachers and homeschooling parents are stretched, and if sharing this free printable helps, I am here for it. Scroll down to see how you can use this simple Christmas tree activity with your students or kids at home. Don’t miss the video I made right after doing this with my students last week.

 

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Counting Christmas Tree Printable Activity

 

Gather your materials. You will need the FREE Christmas tree printable ( it includes the matching numbers), some magnets ( these are my FAVORITE), and a cookie sheet or other magnetic surface. Teaching over zoom is so much easier with magnets, I swear!  Pop a magnet on the tree printable. Cut the number circles out and add magnets to each. I cut my magnets in half or even 1/4 because they are expensive. I colored over a few of the numbers because my zoom lighting is not always the best.

Here are three ways to use this simple printable Christmas math activity for preschool.

Christmas Math Activity For Zoom

As I outline in my Instagram Live, this is how I used this printable Christmas activity today with my multi-aged preschool class.  I held up the cookie sheet with the tree printable and all the number ornaments on the bottom. I told my students the ornaments fell and I needed their help to put them back in the right spots. I explained that they needed to tell me two things; what the number was on the ornament I held up, and what color of dot I should pop it on.

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This served two purposes – number and color recognition. With a multi-aged class, I try to create lessons that meet various levels of ability in one, so everyone can be engaged during group time.

I’d hold it up and my students would yell out the number – I’d repeat the number name and then ask, ” What color dot should I pop it on?”

Sometimes I’d ask, “Should I put this number one at the top of the tree or the bottom?” This helped o get some positional word learning in too.

Keep going!

 

Printable Christmas Activity For Free Choice

For free choice, I grabbed a marker and added the numbers to the tree. This makes this printable Christmas activity easier for children to use independently.

Pop the ornaments on the bottom and let the children match them up as they see fit. The colors still act as a scaffold for children not yet interested or confident in number recognition.

Get your tree and numbers printable here. 

 

Picture Books that support this activity

 

Mooseltoe by Margie Palantini is a funny holiday story with the characters from Moosestash, this time; Moose is set on making Christmas perfectly perfect, only oops, he forgot the tree!  I reviewed this a few years ago when my son was too little to really get the book or to sit long enough for me to finish, but we re-read it last night. He thought it was hilarious, and by the time he was 5, he had fun repeating some of the great melodic text as we read it. The story is one kids and parents can relate to about trying so hard to make the holidays perfect that you forget something important, like the tree!  It’s a silly story with a big heart.

 

10 Trim-the-Tree’ers (Holiday Counting Books) by Janet Schulman is a favorite at our house after only a few readings. We are huge fans of this series, that include  Halloween, Easter, and Valentine’s Day versions as well. In this one, the group of little friends decorates a Christmas tree, and readers count along as they add their items to it, all with a rhyming text. I found the text a little awkward, but it didn’t bug my daughter one bit. We love counting the ornaments over and over and playing little math games while reading.

 

Want more Christmas Activity ideas for kids?

 

Check out these great SCREEN free Christmas activity ideas for kids.