As it has become a tradition on our blog, now that the holiday season is approaching, we bring you ideas to work on Christmas in the classroom and have a great time with your students while continuing with the content of your subject. Christmas is a celebration that can take many different forms and adapt to any subject you teach.

And if these ideas are not enough for you, revisit last year’s post, which includes ideas for various subjects and educational levels.

Shall we begin? Ho, ho, ho!

Christmas in History class: What is the origin of Christmas and its traditions?

Christmas is a celebration with a long history, making the study of its origins something very interesting and valuable. If you teach History at any educational level, a good way to integrate Christmas into your subject is to encourage your students to research the origin of Christmas and its traditions.

To make it a more motivating and interesting task for students, you can create a quiz in Additio App to assess their knowledge of the origins of Christmas and its traditions. Moreover, you don’t have to limit it to Christmas and traditions as we know them in Spain; you can encourage your students to learn more about the origin and history of Christmas in other countries and cultures.

To make it more enjoyable, you can group your students into working teams, and each group can research the history and Christmas traditions of a country or culture. To evaluate them, you can easily use the Magic Box, a feature offered in Additio App.

Christmas in English or languages ​​class: discussion of a Christmas theme

In secondary or high school, a good way to integrate the Christmas theme into an English or language class is to organize a classroom activity involving a debate on a Christmas-related topic. This will help develop vocabulary, encourage speaking, and improve communication skills.

Some open-ended questions you can pose to initiate and encourage debate among your students include the following (although you’re likely to come up with many more!):

• Which Christmas tradition is better?
• Did Santa Claus exist?
• Does Christmas promote consumerism?
• Is Christmas currently a religious or commercial celebration?
• Is Christmas a happy or sad celebration?
• How does Christmas impact the environment?

To assess this debate, you can create a rubric in your Additio App notebook, and you can even make it self-assessment or peer-assessment if you want your students to evaluate themselves or their peers.

In Mathematics class: Mathematical advent calendar

A great way to integrate Christmas into a Math class is to create an advent calendar where students have to solve a mathematical problem to open the corresponding day.

This can be adapted for all educational levels by adjusting the mathematical problems to their level, whether it’s addition and subtraction for younger students or derivative and integral problems for high school. What truly matters is that creating an advent calendar is a gamified activity that will motivate your students to continue learning and apply what they’ve learned in class.

If you prefer not to use physical materials to care for the environment, you can create the advent calendar as a quiz in Additio App. Remember that you can include all kinds of mathematical formulas there, making it easy to implement.

In Spanish Language and Literature: Study of Christmas idioms and expressions

One last idea that we give you to work on Christmas in class is for the subject of Spanish Language and Literature. In this case, a good way to celebrate this holiday is to spend some time studying some common phrases and idiomatic expressions related to Christmas.

To do this, in class you can study the origins of these expressions, see what they mean, what uses are made of them… This activity has several benefits for your students:

• It will enrich your vocabulary: You may already know some of the expressions, but surely there are other expressions that you don’t know, and you are going to see how to use them in normal language. Additionally, for those idioms you already know, you will be able to see their origins and better understand their meaning.
• Improving communication skills: Knowing new idiomatic expressions will allow your students to develop their communication skills, gaining fluency and confidence in the use of idioms and idioms. And if they are related to Christmas, it will surely motivate them even more!
• Improving reflection on culture and traditions: Many expressions and phrases about Christmas have a strong cultural and/or religious meaning, and their study allows us to reflect on the culture and values ​​that surround them.

Are you going to do any Christmas-related activities in class?

Christmas is not everyone’s cup of tea, and you may not be going to do any activities related to it. Tell us, are you going to work on Christmas in your subject? How are you going to do it? We read you on our social networks: Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Youtube.

May you have many gifts from Santa Claus!