Celebrating Ramadan for Kids

March 4, 2024 by Sarah White Leave a Comment

Ramadan is the ninth month in the Islamic calendar and is a time when adults fast during the day and celebrate the end of the month with a holiday called Eid.

Kids aren’t required to fast but they might be tasked to do a good deed each day of the month, or they may collect money or clothing donations to go to a good cause. They can help set up the iftar (evening meal that breaks the fast), help prepare traditional foods, make crafts and take time to be good to other people. Modest Munchies has a great list of ways to include kids in your Ramadan observance.

Hana’s Happy Home has an adorable printable Ramadan “advent” calendar you can add activities or little treats to for your kids.

NutureStore has a collection of printable Ramadan matching cards that can be used to educate kids of any background about the month. They can also serve as a visual reminder to Muslim kids of what activities are going on such as reading, praying or visiting the mosque. (These are free when you sign up for emails.)

Paper Trail Design has a Ramadan I-spy that can be used in the classroom or at home if kids need something to do while waiting for iftar.

Check out this post from Red Ted Art for lots of ideas of how to craft and decorate for Ramadan and Eid. You can also buy a unit study on Ramadan from Teach Me Islam if you want to dig deeper with STEM, arts and crafts and creative play activities around the month.

If you want to learn more about Ramadan with your kids, the picture book Ramadan and Eid al-Fitr by Sara Khan is a good place to start. It follows a girl talking about the preparations her family does for Ramadan and how they celebrate Eid with their community. It also includes information about the lunar calendar used in Islam, which is why Ramadan happens at different times of year. There’s also a tutorial for making a Ramadan pop up card, information about why Muslims do good deeds during the month, and a recipe for Ramadan cookies (butter sugar cookies).

Ramadan Lantern Crafts

DIY Lantern Favor Boxes for Eid

Eid Coloring Page

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Fine Motor Task Cards for Kids

I don’t know why Pinterest just suddenly decided I needed to see all the content about task cards and task boxes for kids, but these ideas are great for the classroom to keep in centers or have on hand for early finishers. You can also use them at home as quiet bags or boxes for kids to use when younger siblings might be sleeping, or in the car for a non-screen activity.

Let’s take a look at some fine motor skill task cards and how you can use them to teach kids skills while they play.

Pre-K Pages has a nice set of playdough task cards you can use in boxes or bags with a little tray (or they can just work on the table if they are sitting at a table). Working with clay or play dough is a great fine motor skill exercise, or you can add these to your playdough center if you have one to give them a little bit of direction while they work.

Teaching Mama has a bunch of great ideas for fine motor task boxes, from practicing working a glue bottle to threading beads, using clothespins or scissors, dropping water, finger painting and more. There’s a free printable that shows all the task options she talks through in the post if you want to make your own little boxes, or just keep these ideas on hand when you’re ready to add some fine motor fun to your days.

One of the ideas she mentions in that post is working with a hole punch, and Early Learning Ideas has a whole bunch (the urge to write “hole bunch” is strong) of ideas for printables that help kids practice hole punching, whether it’s a strip with circles on it for them to punch or pictures that include circles for punching, these ideas make it a little more fun to practice this important skill.

My Happy Place Teaching has a whole post about using fine motor task boxes in kindergarten, and her paid resource includes more than 100 task ideas with printables. But if you don’t need 100 boxes you can still get some good ideas from this post about different tasks to include and why and when you can use them. She also mentions using them in the morning while you’re busy with kids coming in at different times, which is a great idea.

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