With homework to mark, lessons to prepare, counselling forms to complete, and so much more, teachers are often looking for activities that require little preparation, and we usually make it one of our top priorities when searching for or creating new games, but on the occasion that a teacher finds themselves with a little extra time on their hands, we list here some fun party activities that teachers may like to consider making.
WATCH A CLIP OF US PLAYING "SKI SLOPE BINGO" AND OTHER FUN CHRISTMAS GAMES IN THE COMPILATION VIDEO ABOVE
Ski Slope Bingo
It's not easy making games or activities that can be played on and offline. Fortunately for us all, bingo can be fun in both settings.
With just a little effort a cardboard box can easily be converted into a candy cane ski slope for a winter Christmassy vibe, and a target can then be created by reusing an old see-through plastic egg carton. Place a paper print of Christmas vocabulary underneath the see-through plastic carton, so a ball that is launched from the top of the slope landing in a pot of the egg carton will indicate one of the pictures of the paper print. Students then cross off the corresponding picture of their own bingo sheet.
It may take some additional effort to make, but we believe in going that extra mile when it comes to our Christmas party games!!
Materials :
- Cardboard boxes
- See-through plastic egg carton (The bigger the better)
- Teachers should prepare a print to place under the egg carton with Christmas vocabulary positioned directly under each egg trough.
- Strong glue to bind each section of the ski slope
Blow Ice Hockey
What sport could say "winter" more than a game of ice hockey? Not many in our opinion.
The images required to build our stadium were all readily available from the internet, with a couple of additional Santa hats painted on to audience to add to the festive mood. We also painted up some ping pong balls with mistletoe, snowflakes, snowmen and a pokeball (that one isn't Christmassy, but we thought the children would get a kick out of seeing it anyway).
In class we readied straws for each child and played rounds of blow ice hockey - We placed a ping pong ball in the centre and on "GO" the teams scored points by blowing the ball into the opposing team's net (younger children may have trouble blowing with any strength for long periods, so we let them hit the balls with their straws, instead)
Materials :
- A hockey pitch with nets at either side and barriers around to stop the ball.
- Ping pong balls
- A straw to blow through for each player
What fell down the chimney?
Here's another fun game that you can play on or offline. Though it is best played in kindergarten-aged classes, teachers may find that elementary school aged students enjoy it, too.
We built the chimney in the image by stacking cardboard boxes up, binding them together, and then painting them. We cut a window in the front, about 10 centimetres from the ground and a hole at the top, so that when an object is dropped from the top it passes the window at the front and lands below the window, and out of sight. In this way students can briefly see what has fallen. The first student to raise their hand may take a guess at what they believe they saw. A correct answer earns a point for their team.
Materials :
- A chimney made from 3 cardboard boxes stacked on top of one another
- Christmas-related objects to drop down the chimney (teachers should teach the vocabulary of all of the objects before dropping them, to prepare students)
Xmas Guided Cup Maze Game
The guided cup maze game can be played in groups or in private classes. Our original cardboard game was designed that the maze could be lifted out, and replaced, meaning the game could be played multiple times without getting tedious.
The game of the image was cut from a large cardboard box. Cardboard is a cheap material that can be modified with standard stationary, although it can break with a more boisterous group of students, so we have since built a newer, tougher version out of wood (fortunately for us a fence needed dismantling).
String is wound around two thick cardboard rolls at the top of the game, and a paper cup vessel hangs from the centre of the string carrying a marble. In group classes, one student takes the string on one side, and another takes the string on the other side. They close their eyes, while their teammates instructs them how to pull the string to reach the goal at the top within a time limit, and without losing the marble from the cup.
Materials :
- One large cardboard box to build the game
- Two thick cardboard rods glued to the top of the game to wind the string around
- String wind around the rods and carry the cup
- A marble to place in the cup
- A timer
* After 5 years, and since we had come upon a disused wooden fence for materials, we finally retired our cardboard game, hacked up the fence, sanded it down, painted it up and waxed it so the vessel would slide across the surface more easily, and hey presto guided cup maze game mark 2.0.
Our cardboard guided cup maze game above and the new wooden version below.
Big Pen Picture Guess
This game plays like normal picture guess, but with the added challenge of having to guide a large and heavy pen to draw your picture. Once a large enough pen is made teachers may also consider threading string from one side through to the other near the nib at at the bottom of the pen. Teams of 4 could then each hold one of the ends of string and work as a group to recreate a Christmas image on the board.
Materials :
- Large pen made from a thick cardboard / plastic tube
- A marker to attach to the top to make the nib
- String, if teachers wish to play the team variant of the game
Teachers may access the instructions for the original "picture guess" game by left-clicking the button below.
Penguins Can Fly?
- Coming Soon -
