It’s Christmas time and children love the festive season! With plenty of activities and sights, there is something for all ages to enjoy at this time of the year.
Getting in touch with friends and family near and abroad has never been more important – and Christmas cards are a great way of sending greetings and keeping up communications. This is an important message to convey to children and you can use it to discuss different ways of being in touch – from modern technology to traditional letter writing.
Making Christmas cards
Whilst it’s easier (and quicker!) to buy your Christmas cards from a shop, there’s something ultra-personal about making them with your child and a homemade card is often really appreciated by the recipient.
Depending on the age of your child you may want to consider different ways to decorate homemade cards.
- Older children with more advanced motor skills will enjoy cutting and sticking whilst being supervised by adults. You could help them to draw the outline of a shape such as a Christmas tree or a snowman, then encourage them to decorate it with sensory materials such as cotton wool or aluminium foil (a very fun sensory activity for toddlers).
- You could also suggest to your child that they source the materials they want to use to decorate their Christmas cards. Perhaps you could go on a walk together with a cup or a bucket and collect things such as leaves or flower petals to use.
- For children who are still developing their fine motor skills, you might want to try something like potato stamping. This can be a really fun activity and you can cut the stamps into simple shapes which look decorative on a plain card.
- Younger children can still get involved with making Christmas cards. Why not help them participate by gently covering their hand or foot in child-friendly paints and doing some hand, foot or finger painting on the folded card?
Sending the cards
You can extend this activity from making the cards to discussing with your child where the cards will be going. You may want to take them to friends in person and encourage your child to hand over the card they have made.
For friends and family further afield, perhaps you could get your child involved in putting the cards into envelopes. Whilst you’ll need to write the name and address, you could engage your child with putting on stamps and then take a walk to the post office or the mailbox to send the cards off around the world.
