The holiday season is the perfect time to teach elementary students about the power of kindness and community support. Everyday Speech’s Community SEL Holiday Craft offers an engaging and meaningful way to bring these lessons to life. Through the Gingerbread Village: Community of Care activity, students can reflect on how they can help others, express their creativity, and contribute to a collective classroom project that celebrates kindness.
Why Focus on Community Support During the Holidays?
The holidays are a time for giving, gratitude, and connection. Teaching students about community support during this season reinforces the importance of helping others, sharing resources, and showing kindness. These lessons extend beyond the holidays, equipping students with lifelong social-emotional skills that foster empathy and cooperation.
Everyday Speech’s Community SEL Holiday Craft combines creativity and reflection, making it an ideal classroom activity to inspire students to think about how they can positively impact their families, friends, and communities.
How the Gingerbread Village Activity Works
The Gingerbread Village: Community of Care activity is simple to set up and highly engaging for students. Here’s how it works:
1. Create a Gingerbread House Card
Each student starts by cutting out and folding a gingerbread house outline into a card.
2. Decorate the Exterior
Students personalize the outside of their gingerbread house with colors, designs, and decorations that reflect their unique style.
3. Reflect on Kindness
Inside the card, students write or draw one way they plan to help their family, friends, or community this season.
4. Build the Village
Once completed, all the gingerbread houses are displayed together on a bulletin board to create a Gingerbread Village.
5. Explore the Village
Students take time to view their classmates’ contributions, gaining inspiration from the many ways their peers plan to spread kindness.
Benefits of the Community Holiday SEL Craft
This Community SEL Holiday Craft is more than just an art project—it’s a powerful way to teach SEL concepts and foster a positive classroom culture.
Social-Emotional Learning Benefits:
- Encourages Reflection: Students consider how their actions can support others.
- Builds Empathy: By seeing their peers’ ideas, students learn to appreciate diverse perspectives.
- Promotes Collaboration: The collective display reinforces the idea that everyone’s contributions matter.
- Develops Self-Awareness: Writing or drawing about their plans helps students identify their strengths and values.
Creative and Practical Benefits:
- Inspires Creativity: Decorating the gingerbread houses allows students to express themselves artistically.
- Engages All Learners: The hands-on nature of the activity appeals to a wide range of learning styles.
- Easy to Execute: With printable templates, this activity is quick to set up and adaptable for any classroom size.
Tips for Integrating the Activity into Your Classroom
The Gingerbread Village activity is versatile and can be adapted to fit your schedule and classroom needs. Here are some tips for making the most of it:
1. Set the Stage
Start with a discussion about kindness and community. Ask students to share examples of how they’ve helped others or how others have helped them.
2. Encourage Creativity
Provide a variety of art supplies—markers, glitter, stickers, and more—so students can make their gingerbread houses truly unique.
3. Facilitate Sharing
Create time for students to share their gingerbread houses and the ideas they wrote inside. This builds confidence and reinforces the importance of their contributions.
4. Extend the Lesson
Use the activity as a springboard for other holiday-themed SEL lessons, such as gratitude journals or acts of kindness challenges.
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Everyday Speech: Supporting SEL in Classrooms
The Community SEL Holiday Craft is just one of many resources Everyday Speech offers to help educators teach SEL concepts in engaging and meaningful ways. From video modeling lessons to interactive activities, Everyday Speech provides tools to help students develop empathy, self-awareness, and social responsibility.
During the holiday season, activities like the Gingerbread Village offer a unique opportunity to reinforce these skills in a festive and fun way.
Closing Thoughts
Teaching students about kindness and community support during the holidays sets the stage for meaningful connections and lasting social-emotional growth. Everyday Speech’s Community SEL Holiday Craft, featuring the Gingerbread Village: Community of Care, provides a creative and reflective way for students to explore these important themes.
By participating in this activity, students will not only create a beautiful village of kindness but also develop a deeper understanding of how they can make a positive impact. Celebrate the season by fostering empathy, creativity, and collaboration in your classroom with this heartwarming holiday craft.
Sample Video
Students learn best by watching others their same-age model the behavior! Check out a sample video modeling lesson below. We offer our entire Social-Emotional Learning platform free for 14 days here!
Related Blog Posts:
Fostering Empathy and Kindness in Elementary Students
