Christmas lesson plan (2)

Stand-alone lesson ESL kids lesson plan

Lesson plans for ESL kids teachers

Christmas (2)

In this lesson, students review Christmas vocabulary from the last lesson, make Christmas cards, sing a and play lots of fun Christmas games.

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Age: 3-12 years
Time: 40 mins – 1 hour
Objectives: Recognize and identify 8 Christmas words and sing a Christmas carol.
Structures: “Merry Christmas”, “Here you are”, “Thank you”.
Target vocabulary: [hide_on_uk]Santa[/hide_on_uk][hide_on_us]Father Christmas[/hide_on_us], Rudolph, sleigh, presents, Christmas tree, decorations, roast turkey, Christmas pudding

Lesson materials

Flashcards:

[hide_on_uk]Santa[/hide_on_uk][hide_on_us]Father Christmas[/hide_on_us], Rudolph, presents, Christmas tree, decorations, roast turkey, Christmas pudding

Printables:

Santa maze 2 worksheet

Songs:

“We wish you A merry Christmas” or “Jingle bells” and various Christmas songs for background music.

Additional materials:

Christmas vocab crossword
Christmas vocab word search
Merry Christmas! worksheet

Supplies:

[hide_on_uk]colored[/hide_on_uk][hide_on_us]coloured[/hide_on_us] crayons / pencils
glue
[hide_on_uk]colored[/hide_on_uk][hide_on_us]coloured[/hide_on_us] construction paper / card
common craft supplies (e.g. glitter, paint, felt, cotton wool, shiny stickers, etc.)
envelopes
small [hide_on_uk]candies[/hide_on_uk][hide_on_us]wrapped sweets[/hide_on_us]
wrapping paper
device to play the songs on

Notes:

This is the second lesson in a set of 2, following on from our first Christmas lesson plan. It uses the vocab from lesson 1 and is a Christmas “party” lesson.

Christmas Lesson 1 procedure:

Warm up and maintenance:

1. Start the lesson as you usually would (E.g. Hello song, “What’s your name?”, “How are you?”, homework check, etc.).

2. Explain that today you are going to have a fun Christmas party! Put on your Christmas songs CD as background music. If you still have the paper chain decorations from the last lesson, put them up around the room.

1. Review Christmas vocab: [hide_on_uk]Santa[/hide_on_uk][hide_on_us]Father Christmas[/hide_on_us], Rudolph, sleigh, presents, Christmas tree, decorations, roast turkey, Christmas pudding
Before class, hide these flashcards around the room. Model by showing you are looking for the [hide_on_uk]Santa[/hide_on_uk][hide_on_us]Father Christmas[/hide_on_us] flashcard. Hunt around the room until you find the card. Now tell the students to find the other flashcards.

New learning and practice:

2. Play “Flashcard touch” and “Missing flashcard”

Flashcard touch: Lay the flashcards on the floor. Tell the students to put their hands in the air. Then Teacher calls out a flashcard (e.g. “Christmas tree!”). Students have to touch the card as quickly as they can. Play for a few rounds until you have done all of the flashcards.
Missing flashcard: Tell the students to close their eyes. Take away a flashcard and tell the students to open their eyes again. Ask, “Which picture is missing?”. Students have to shout out the missing flashcard. Play a few rounds.

Note:

For larger groups, divide your students into groups of 6-8 and play the games in their groups.

3. Make Christmas cards
Christmas cards are easy and fun to make in class with some construction paper and common craft supplies. Before class, you’ll need to cut out enough card for each student.

Tell the students they are going to make a Christmas card for one of their classmates. Either assign a classmate for each student to make a card for or let them chose themselves. Then have students draw, paint or use felt to make a Christmas scene on the card ([hide_on_uk]Santa[/hide_on_uk][hide_on_us]Father Christmas[/hide_on_us], holly, a Christmas Tree , etc.). Students can then decorate the cards with glitter, cotton wool for snow, shiny stickers, etc.

Older kids can write a Christmas message inside the card and for smaller kids you can help them write their own message (even get them to trace over a message written lightly in pencil). Make sure they include their classmate’s name with the message.

Finally, the students put their Christmas card into an envelope.

4. Present Christmas cards and sing “We wish you a merry Christmas”
Get all the kids sitting in groups with the Christmas tree pine cones they made in the last class. Teach the expressions “Merry Christmas”, “Here you are” and “Thank you”. Then model giving a Christmas card to a student whist saying the expressions. Then have the students give their Christmas cards to their classmates while saying the expressions. Everyone can now open their Christmas cards. Ask some students questions about their cards (e.g. Who was your card from? What is the picture? What does it say inside?).

Now sing the carol from last week’s lesson:

Lyrics for “We wish you a merry Christmas“

Chorus:
We wish you a merry Christmas,
We wish you a merry Christmas,
We wish you a merry Christmas,
And a happy New Year.

Verse 1:
Santa and Rudolph,
Will fly in their sleigh,
We’ll open our presents,
And have a great day!

Chorus

Verse 2:
Our Christmas tree’s up,
With decorations,
We’ll eat a roast turkey,
And Christmas pudding.

Chorus

Verse 1 again

Chorus

Verse 2 again

Before playing the song, line up the flashcards on the floor or the board. Then, play the song and prompt the words by touching the flashcards.

[hide_on_uk]Short sample (members get full-length song):
<br /> [/hide_on_uk]

[hide_on_us]Short sample (members get full-length song):
<br /> [/hide_on_us]

Note:

We also have an adapted version of the carol “Jingle bells” which you may want to use instead of or as well as “We wish you a merry Christmas”.

You can play / download Jingle bells on our songs page.

5. Play “Flashcard pass the parcel”
All kids love this game! Before class prepare the parcel. Make sure you have enough [hide_on_uk]candies[/hide_on_uk][hide_on_us]wrapped sweets[/hide_on_us] for each student and a picture / flashcard of the Christmas vocab for each student. The idea is for each layer of the parcel to have a [hide_on_uk]candy[/hide_on_uk][hide_on_us]sweet[/hide_on_us] stuck to vocab picture (e.g. [hide_on_uk]Santa[/hide_on_uk][hide_on_us]Father Christmas[/hide_on_us], Christmas tree, etc.). When each wrapping paper is removed the student will have to correctly say the word of the picture in order to keep the [hide_on_uk]candy[/hide_on_uk][hide_on_us]sweet[/hide_on_us]. Wrap up the first [hide_on_uk]candy[/hide_on_uk][hide_on_us]sweet[/hide_on_us] / picture and then for each layer add another picture / [hide_on_uk]candy[/hide_on_uk][hide_on_us]sweet[/hide_on_us].

Play the game sitting in a big circle. Play Christmas music and have everyone pass the parcel around the circle until you stop the music. The student unwraps the first layer and has to say the word for the picture to get the [hide_on_uk]candy[/hide_on_uk][hide_on_us]sweet[/hide_on_us]. Keep going and make sure every student has a chance to remove a layer and get a [hide_on_uk]candy[/hide_on_uk][hide_on_us]sweet[/hide_on_us].

6. Play “Musical chairs” or “Musical cushions”
Put enough chairs or cushions in a circle for each student, less one (e.g. if you have 10 students put out 9 chairs or cushions). Play the music and have the students walk or skip around the circle of chairs. When you stop the music the students have to scramble to sit down on a chair. The student remaining is out. For the next round remove a chair. Finally, the game will have 2 students and one chair and the winner is the only one remaining.

7. If you still have time, play another Christmas party game
We have lots of Christmas games & activities – select any you feel will work well.

Wrap up:

1. Assign homework: “Santa maze 2” worksheet.

2. Do your usual end of class routine (tidy up, put away things in their bags, sing “Goodbye song”, etc).

3. As each student goes to the door to leave the classroom show them a flashcard and elicit the word (e.g. [hide_on_uk]Santa[/hide_on_uk][hide_on_us]Father Christmas[/hide_on_us]). If they get the word right, they can leave. If wrong, they have to go to the back of the line and try again.