December Lesson Plans

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December Teaching Ideas for Your Classroom

Winter is here, and it is the holiday season for you and your students. For various reasons, December is the favorite time of the year for almost all students. Besides holidays, there are many great things to look forward to, like enjoying a cup of hot chocolate on chilly winter nights, curling up in your warm and cozy bed, and reading a holiday storybook.

If you are looking for some engaging teaching ideas to make the most of the December months, you have come to the right place.

1. Writing Prompts Based on Holidays

Writing prompts are an effective teaching tool to improve writing skills among students. So, take a break from the regular writing topics and focus on holiday-themed writing prompts to inspire the students and drive their creativity and energy for writing. Make the most of this opportunity to encourage students to write more.

Here are some December writing prompt ideas you can assign your students to invigorate their creative juices:

- My favorite holiday is...
- I love December because...
- Write about your most famous holiday party ever!
- I love New Year because...
- I want... for this holiday because...
- I love playing in the snow because...

Encouraging writing and journaling help students in many ways. It teaches them how to put their feelings, thoughts, and emotions on paper, reduces stress, and gives them a chance to get to know themselves better.

2. Use Holiday Advertisements to Improve Grammar and Writing Skills

Holiday advertisements are an excellent way to promote reading, writing, and grammar skills. You can collect some holiday ads and pick descriptive passages to analyze with the students. Here are some skills you should focus on:

- Comma usage
- Adverbs
- Prepositional phrases
- Adjectives
- Verbs
- Nouns
- Pronouns
- Adverbs
- Modifying adjectives
- Comparisons
- Compound adjectives
- Direct objects

You'd be surprised how much you can teach the students simply by reading a small passage. You can also make use of sentence analysis flowcharts in case your students need some additional help to analyze the passages.

Another great way to encourage creativity and writing is to assign a task to design a holiday ad and come up with a text. You can give the students some ad templates and basic arts n craft supplies to start.

3. Write a Letter to a Loved One Living Far Away

You may not get to meet all your loved ones on holidays because they live far away. A great December teaching idea is to ask the students to write a letter to people who are special to them. Teach them the proper format to draft the letter, and provide colors, markers, stickers, and glitter for decoration. Letter writing is a skill that will help them in their personal and professional lives.

4. Conducting a Book Talk

December is a great month to hold a book talk for the students. You can spread the book talk over several days, and having them back-to-back may get boring for the students. Encourage the students to make notes on the talks to ensure they are listening and not distracted.

A book talk involves giving a short speech to encourage someone to read a book. It gives them an idea about the plot and characters while developing their interest in the book. Book talks serve as a teaching tool to expand the reading taste of students and provide them with a platform where they can discuss their favorite books.

You can also create a book recommendation board for your class. Ask students to write the titles and authors of their favorite books they would like to discuss.

For the book talk to be effective, keep it short! This way, the audience won't get bored.

5. Decorate the Classroom Based on a Winter Theme

Create a winter wonderland in your classroom with your students. Classroom themes are a great way to decorate the class and encourage their love for learning. You can also add informational charts to help engage students with the content being taught. It is also a great way for students to make connections and develop their vocabulary and comprehension skills.

You can decorate the class with snowflake hangings, snowman posters, posters of winder animals, students' winter-themed art projects, white-streamer hangings, white lights around the windows and bookshelves, etc.

6. Assign a Mini Research Project

Assign a mini winter-themed research project to your students to help improve their research skills. Divide the students into groups and assign them a topic to research, for example, "How to Stay Warm in Icy Winter" or "Research on Winter Plants and Animals."

7. Reading Books About Winter

December is the perfect time to engage your students in some reading. Here are some of our top picks:

- First Snow by Bomi Park
- Sneezy the Snowman by Maureen Wright
- Over and Under by Kate Messner
- The Snowy Day by Ezra Jack Keats
- Blizzard by John Rocco
- Snowflake Bentley by Jacqueline Briggs Martin, illustrated by Mary Azarian
- Oliver and Amanda and the Big Snow by Jean Van Leeuwen, illustrated by Amy Schweninger
- Here Comes Jack Frost by Kazuno Kohara

8. Writing Weather Poems

The winter months, especially December, bring some interesting weather that can be used as an inspiration to write poems. Encourage your students to use the attraction of the winter season and incorporate it into their poetry. Writing winter poems is an effective tool to improve writing skills. You can also give your students a list of words to use in their poems.

9. Create a Winter Hand Print Tree

What is more fun than hand painting? If your students love using their arts to make art, this fun December activity will be a big hit! For this activity, use brown paint on the hands to make the tree branches. Then ask your students to paint the bark. Use white paint to show snow on the branches and snow on the ground.

Wrapping Up

We hope this article will help you prepare your December lesson plan well. Teaching and learning can be a lot of fun if you incorporate some engaging activities into your lesson plans.