Learning about Kwanzaa

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.

My daughter has always liked math, which is a relief to me as someone who never really got math when I was growing up. (As a knitter I use math a lot now and have managed to learn what I need, but not much else.)

For kids who aren’t fans of math who could use a little encouragement and understanding of what math is for, there’s Dear Math, We’re Not Friends by Lina Chopra Haldar with illustrations by Teresa Martinez.

Nikil starts school not liking math and his teacher has him write letters to math. He complains that math makes his tummy hurt but thinks it’s funny when his teacher says talking about shapes and drawing are part of math.

As the year goes on he learns about skip counting, counting backwards, fractions and the special names for different shapes. When he learns about octagons he starts seeing them everywhere. He discovers that math is part of being an astronaut and an artist, two things he might like to be when he grows up.

Math helps him with soccer and helps bees make honey, and he uses it in his art projects, too. In the end he decides that math really is his friend because it helps you make things and understand the world around you.

The book is cute and has full illustrations that literally show math in different environments. It also includes a page about the inspiration for the story and why the author, a math teacher herself, wanted to write a book addressing math anxiety. It has prompts kids can use to write their own letters to math or use in discussions about math, as well as other ideas to help kids feel more confident about math.

This would be a good book for math teachers and others to have on hand for those kids who don’t love math or see a purpose for it outside of the classroom. The target reader is ages 5-8.

About the book: 32 pages, hardcover. Published 2026 by Beaming Books. Suggested retail price $19.99.

Have you read?

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