Christmas Montessori activities

Today I’m sharing a number of Montessori Christmas activities for kids you can try out with your little ones.

One thing I have really come to enjoy about homeschooling my preschoolers is coming up with activities related to each of our themes. A lot of the activities I plan are inspired by the Montessori method. I have so much respect for the way Maria Montessori viewed young children and their potential, and I love the Montessori philosophy of following the lead of the child. That being said, I am not a certified Montessori teacher, and not everything we do is Montessori-based. Nonetheless, I hope you’ll find some inspiration in the ideas I share below. I also have lots of other (non-Montessori) Christmas ideas on my Christmas activities for kids page.

Put the bells on Santa

For this activity, I printed out the Santa do-a-dot printable from my Christmas do-a-dot printables pack. I included a pair of easy grip tweezers and a small bowl of bells. Kids use the tweezers to place one bell in each of the dots on Santa.

Decorate the Christmas Tree with pom poms

For this activity, I printed out the Christmas tree do-a-dot page from my Christmas do-a-dot printables pack. I included some glue and a small bowl of red pom poms. Kids dab a spot of glue in each dot on the tree and then stick a red pom pom on the tree to “decorate” it.

Christmas stocking lacing activity

For this activity I printed the Christmas stocking lacing activity from my Christmas Printable Pack on to card stock. I included a length of yarn as well. (I wrapped tape around one end of the yarn to make it easy to thread through the holes in the stocking – a shoe lace might be a good substitute.)

Kids then lace the yarn all the way around the stocking. When I showed this activity to QBoy he had a very difficult time remembering to keep the thread in his right hand. He also got easily confused about whether to put the thread through the top of each hole or the bottom. So this is definitely a skill we need to keep working on!

Golf tee fine motor activity

For this activity I printed off another copy of the Santa do-a-dot printable from my Christmas do-a-dot printables pack. In the bowl, I placed red golf tees.

The goal is to stand one golf tee on each of Santa’s dots. For young children it can be very tricky to place one golf tee without knocking another over.

Decorate the Christmas tree with stickers

On this tray I placed the Decorate the Christmas Tree v.1 activity from my Christmas Printable Pack. I also included some colorful stickers. Kids use the stickers to cover each of the stars on the tree. Peeling these small stickers is challenging for tiny hands and provides a great fine motor workout.

Make a candy cane out of pipe cleaners

On this tray I placed red and white pipe cleaners (aka, chenille stems) measuring about 5″ in length. I also placed a sample candy cane. I showed my kids how to twist a red and white pipe cleaner together and then bend it in order to create a candy cane. QBoy was so excited about this activity and made candy canes for everyone in our family and for his friends as well. I ended up having to buy more pipe cleaners so he could continue!

Christmas scissors practice

This activity is from my Christmas Printable Pack. I provided two different cutting patterns and a pair of scissors for my kids to practice their scissors skills.

Christmas sorting activity

This is another activity from my Christmas Printable Pack. On the tray I placed a sheet with two boxes, one labeled “presents” and one labeled “ornaments.” In the bowl on the left I put pictures of presents and ornaments.

Kids sort the pictures into the appropriate box. If desired, kids can even glue them to the paper.

An alternative version of this would be to give kids a basket with real presents and real ornaments inside and have them sort the obejcts into piles.

Build a Christmas tree

This activity works on children’s understanding of length. I placed a blank sheet of paper on the right. On the left I included a little basket with a glue stick, strips of green paper, and a small strip of brown paper.

I cut the green strips so that each one was 1/2″ longer than the previous one. The shortest strip is 1″ and the longest strip is 5.5″. Kids assemble them into a tree shape by placing them in order from shortest to longest. The short brown strip goes at the bottom to make the tree trunk.

For younger kids, I would suggest giving them fewer strips and grading them in 1″ increments rather than 1/2″ increments.

Decorate the Christmas tree

For this activity I printed an outline of a Christmas tree from my Christmas Tree Outlines printable. I provided some glue as well as tissue paper squares. Kids crumple up the green tissue paper squares and glue them on to the tree. For added fun, I included some adhesive back jewels that kids can use to decorate their trees.

Mini Christmas lights fine motor activity

For this activity I provided a muffin tin, a small measuring spoon, and a bowl of mini Christmas lights. Kids use the measuring spoon to scoop the lights one-by-one out of the bowl and place them individually into the muffin tin cups. This activity provides kids with both fine motor practice as well as practice with one-to-one correspondence. I teach my kids to place the lights into the muffin tin by filling the holes from top to bottom and from left to right, just like we read in English.

Ribbon tying exercise

QBoy has been really interested in tying his own shoes lately, so I thought this would be a fun activity to give him some additional tying practice. I cut out some lengths of red ribbon and put them in a bowl. I also provided a stick. The kids have to tie the ribbons on to the stick. I don’t anticipate that XGirl will do this work as it is above her level, but it is perfect for QBoy at this time.

Christmas Gift Size Sorting

This activity comes straight out of my Christmas Printable Pack. The goal is for kids to put the presents in order from smallest to largest.

Christmas sensory bin

I don’t think that sensory bins are strictly Montessori. Nonetheless, when kids play with sensory bins they engage in many of the practical life skills that are part of the common Montessori curriculum, like pouring, scooping, etc. Plus, my kids just love sensory bins! So I couldn’t resist putting together this very simple bin using rice left over from last year’s Christmas sensory bin along with several inexpensive Christmas-themed dolls and toys.

Christmas-themed patterning practice

I printed out these Christmas gift patterning templates from my Christmas Printable Pack. I started a pattern on each strip using red and green do-a-dot markers.

These are the different types of patterns I prepared for the kids to continue filling in. XGirl does really well with simple ABAB patterns but still struggles a bit with the rest. She really likes using the do-a-dot markers, so she gets very motivated to practice this kind of activity.

Race to the House for Christmas Game

XGirl loves this Race to the House for Christmas game from my Christmas Printable Pack. On the tray I provided the printable, a bowl of green glass gems, a bowl of red glass gems, and one of our jumbo foam dice.

The idea is to roll the dice, count the dots on the dice, and then mark off that number of Santas with the green gems. Then roll the dice, count the dots, and mark off that number of snowmen with the red gems. The first character (Santa or the snowman) to reach the house wins!

This game can be played solo or with a partner. When we play the game with partners, we play such that the “competition” is between Santa and the snowman, not between the two people rolling the dice.

Christmas Addition Game

This addition game comes from my Christmas Printable Pack. I prepared a game board on the right, and bowls on the left with yellow sum cards, white addend cards, and mini Christmas lights for counting.

Kids play by selecting two white addend cards and placing them in the addend boxes. Below each number, kids will count out mini Christmas lights equal to each number. Finally, kids tally the sum and place the corresponding yellow sum card in the box to the right of the equal sign.

Find the Letter S for Santa

I am currently working with my kids on their letters. QBoy has got most of the alphabet down while XGirl is still in the early stages of letter recognition. This worksheets comes from my Find the Letter S for Santa printable featuring both uppercase and lowercase versions. On this tray I placed the worksheet as well as some mini Christmas trees in the small basket on the left.

XGirl uses the mini Christmas trees to mark all of the S’s on the worksheet.

Gingerbread Man Themed Fill in the Missing Lowercase Letters

QBoy has made huge strides in recent weeks in knowing the alphabet and being able to put all of the letters in alphabetic order. This activity works to strengthen his knowledge of ABC order, and it comes straight from my Christmas Printable Pack. Rather than having him write in the letters (which would be a tad difficult for him), I provided the missing letters in the tray using our lower case letter beads.

When the activity is completed it looks like this.

 

I hope you found some inspiration in this post for activities you can do with your own children. Let me know which activities your children enjoy most!

More Christmas resources

More Christmas posts from Gift of Curiosity:

• Grow a Christmas tree sponge
• Q-tip painted Christmas tree
• Paper plate reindeer craft
• Christmas sensory bin
• Cinnamon Christmas ornaments
• Candy cane experiment
• Christmas game: What’s in the bag?
• Christmas Printables Pack
• Christmas Bingo
• Christmas do-a-dot printables
• Christmas gingerbread man templates

For more Christmas activities your kids will love, see my Christmas Activities for Kids page and my Christmas Activities for Kids Pinterest board. 

Follow Katie @ Gift of Curiosity’s board Christmas Activities for Kids on Pinterest.

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