Practice Cutting and Folding with the Christmas Tree Activity

When I first saw this paper Christmas tree craft from Krokotak, I thought it would be a great project for little ones learning to cut straight lines.

The tree is made by cutting strips, but not cutting all the way across, a piece of paper, then the strips are folded to make the loops. Instead of eyeballing where the lines go, you could physically draw lines for little kids so they would know where to cut and when to stop.

You can see the full DIY by clicking over (and there are lots of other great Christmas tree crafts over there you won’t want to miss, so go check it out).

Of course an adult could also do the cutting for younger kids and leave them with the fine-motor challenge of gluing and sticking the loops to make the tree shape. And for older kids it would just be a fun tree craft they can embellish with pom-poms, construction paper ornaments, stickers, little jingle bells and more.

[Photo via Krokotak.]

Looking for more Fine motor Activities? Check out these kits, games and Activity books.

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Does Your Child Learn Better With Hands On Tasks?

Holidays are a great time to pull in some themed STEM projects. Even kids who aren’t usually into science can get excited about making a reindeer fly or making a Christmas tree out of 3D shapes. Check out these fun Christmas STEM activities to try in your classroom or at home.

Speaking of making reindeer fly, there are lots of different takes on this engineering challenge. In the instructions from The Educator’s Spin on it, kids make a reindeer from recycled materials, then use a string to make it “fly.” You can also do this with a balloon, like in this version from Team Cartwright.

And that Christmas tree project? That one is from Steamsational, and it calls for making a bunch of 3D triangles you then assemble into a tree. The post includes all the tips you’ll need and a printable template for making the triangles.

Another cute idea from Steamsational is making Santa’s sleigh out of an egg carton. Give kids design challenges such as that Santa must stay in the sleigh, it should be able to move and pull weight. It’s so fun to see what kids come up with.

Science Sparks has a printable book full of Christmas-themed experiments with templates kids can cut out and use to make spinning sleighs, shadow puppets, a paper tube to test how much weight it can hold and more. These activities are really low prep beyond the printing, so they’re great when you need to fill a little time at home or at school.

If you have Legos and jingle bells you can make a simple engineering challenge by having kids build mazes that the bells can roll through. Get the details from Innovation Kids Lab. (And check out this fun book of Lego Christmas ornaments!)

Of course you can also put a Christmas spin on classic STEM activities, like making a baking soda volcano in a plastic or glass ball ornament (Little Bins for Little Hands), red and green magic milk (Fun Learning for Kids), Borax crystal ornaments (Go Science Kids) and more!

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