15 Life Skills Your Child’s Teacher Won’t Be Teaching Your Kids This Year

I know lot’s of people who think Homework is their only “Educational” duty as a parent. Personally I detest homework it just doesn’t seem to work for us. It involves, shouting, bribing, negotiating and eventually crying and that’s just me. Instead we “learn” in other ways.

I don’t know why it was never intentional but we have always included our kids in everyday adult life. I was one of those parents who let their toddler use a pair or scissors and no not the safety ones either. I am also that parent who lets my kids use a real knife to help prepare dinner. But I am also that parent that cringes when they climb a tree or imagine their neck snapping as they try for the 100th time to do a cartwheel. The only thing going up is my heart rate as I imagine the unthinkable. But somewhere in all the boundaries and lines and parenting styles we do need to teach our kids to survive the world. 15 life skills they don’t teach our kids in school.

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Kwanzaa is a celebration that I’ve written about a little in the past (see: Kwanzaa Activities for Kids) but I feel like it doesn’t always get the attention it deserves since it happens in the week after Christmas. It’s not a time most kids are in school, but you can talk about it as part of winter holidays around the world, or discuss it at home and talk about how you bring the principles of Kwanzaa to your family.

If you need a refresher on the basics, this coloring sheet from Crayola covers the seven principles of Kwanzaa. Kids Activities Blog has a set of printable fact sheets that talk about when it is celebrated, why it was started and what the celebration means. There are also lots of great videos about Kwanzaa for kids, including this song about the seven principles from Sesame Street and a Kwanzaa facts video by Twinkl.

Around the Kampfire has links to other videos and more ideas for talking about Kwanzaa in the classroom. They teach about Kwanzaa in a holidays around the world unit, which you can purchase from them if you need it. Mrs. Richardson’s Class also has a mini unit about Kwanzaa that you can buy that includes vocabulary cards, fact organizers, pocket sorting and a compare and contrast between Christmas, Hanukkah and Kwanzaa.

Crafting a Fun Life has a couple of great projects for your Kwanzaa study, including making a kinara (candle holder) craft out of simple shapes and a collage. She made hers using Kwanzaa stickers and paint, or you can print out Kwanzaa clip art from places like Free Images to use in your project. That’s where the kinara photo above came from.

Need more coloring pages to help your kids learn about Kwanzaa? This set of 17 pages from Academic Intelligence on Teachers Pay Teachers includes individual pages for the seven principles, as well as other images. Another good one on TPT is this Kwanzaa PowerPoint presentation from Shelia Melton, which is great for K-5 students. It goes into good detail about what the seven days mean and how Kwanzaa is celebrated.

I also like these activity sheets from Malisa Goes Digital on Etsy. They include fact cards that you can read and use as a memory game, cutting practice and two-piece matching puzzles.

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