Large Group Literacy: Winter Holidays Around the World

For Holidays Around the World, I sequence the holidays to be taught in the following order:
Advent, St. Nicholas Day, Hanukkah, Winter Solstice, Noche Buena, Christmas, Kwanzaa.

Advent Chain 
Many advent celebrations focus on counting down to Christmas.  This activity makes an advent chain using thin slips of paper.  Each student writes their name on a slip and we staple them into circles, looping them to make a paper chain.  At the end of each day, we remove a chain.  If we can read the student's name then they make take their chain home with them that day.

All I Want For Christmas Is...
Another language chart helping students to communicate preferences using complete sentences.  When I had a teacher website in one county, I would also type up this list for parents to know what their children were saying that they wanted for Christmas at school.

There Was An Old Lady Who Swallowed A Bell retelling

Old Lady is BACK!  Remember those predictions and use whatever props work for you and your budget.

The Snowman Movie to Book Comparison

This is saved for the last day before Christmas Break.  We "read" The Snowman earlier that day.  There are no words in the book so have your students offer what they gather, strengthen their inferential abilities!  Later, we watch The Snowman and students offer what they saw that was the same and what was different.  "Why did they add Santa to the movie?  He wasn't in the book...."

Again, this is the time of year for Parent Conferences so my Large Group Literacy activities will vary to what I need for work samples or what my para would like guide the lesson with.