Sharing A Christmas Carol With Your Entire Family - a Preschool Christmas Activity

Today Kristen from A Mom's Quest to Teach is sharing our next Preschool Christmas Activity--ways to share the classic A Christmas Carol!

One of my all-time favorite stories for the holiday season is A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens. No matter the age of your child, there are so many different ways for you to share this classic story with them. From picture books to the original tale and cartoons and movies, you can share the story of the redemption of Ebeneezer Scrooge with them yearly.

Read Aloud 

Reading aloud the story of Ebeneezer Scrooge, the three Ghosts, and the Cratchit family can become a fantastic holiday tradition. Charles Dickens enjoyed reading the story aloud before audiences of various sizes. His first public performance was in December 1853. He presented the tale over the course of three hours and—without any props or costumes—brought the characters and setting to life. If you wish to read the tale aloud in its entirety or via an abbreviated version, there are multiple editions available. In fact, there is a special Christmas with Dickens by Cedric Charles Dickens that includes the famous tale in an abbreviated version that can be read aloud in about an hour.

For Your Little Ones 

If you have little ones and want to introduce them to the classics there are many books available. One of my favorites is from the BabyLit ®  book series. A Christmas Carol is a colors primer by Jennifer Adams that features key characters from the story and connects them to different colors. It is helpful for the parent or reader of the BabyLit ® to have a good understanding of the story to help fill in the details for children who are curious as to who the characters are and why they are represented the way they are in the board book.  

Learning Words 

To help reinforce the reading of the words and the colors, I created coloring sheets with the words from the story for our children. Depending upon your preference, you could offer your children crayons, colored pencils, markers, or even paint to fill in the words the matching color from the story. This provides a fun way to introduce vocabulary and allow your children to learn their colors. We used colored pencils and then cut the words out so we put the story in order using the words. 

Crafts 

As one of the biggest symbols of the Ghost of Christmas Present is a wreath, we have created several different versions over the years including this new one! I asked our older son to draw the holly in the wreath and our younger children painted the holly leaves and berries in between the leaves. You could also have your children finger paint the berries. We will hang our wreaths up to help decorate our kitchen during the holiday season. 

For Older Siblings 

Pretend Play

Create or purchase hats for your children to wear representing the different characters.

A top hat for Ebeneezer Scrooge

A crown or tiara for the Ghost of Christmas Past

A wreath for the Ghost of Christmas Present

A hood for the Ghost of Christmas Future

A bonnet for Mrs. Cratchit

A cap for Tiny Tim

Retell the Story

Choose one scene from each of Scrooge's trips with the three ghosts and recreate as a diorama. There are some key scenes to pick from in A Christmas Carol. From the past, children can pick from Scrooge's time as a student or while he was working for Mr. Fezziwig. When the Ghost of Christmas Present first arrives, he brings with him a huge feast. He then takes Scrooge to see the Cratchit family. The visit by the Ghost of Christmas Future brings sadder scenes to recreate including a visit to the grave of Scrooge himself.

Creativity Time

For your oldest children, a fun idea might be to take one or two of the more famous quotes from the story and have them write them out in calligraphy or using other fancy lettering. You could also try your hand at knitting as one of the key character features of Tiny Tim and Bob Cratchit is their knitted scarves.

Sharing A Christmas Carol With Your Entire Family was written by Kristen at A Mom's Quest to Teach. Kristen is a housewife and mother to a teenage stepson and two younger children (son, 6, and daughter, 4). Kristen holds a BA in History and an MS in Teaching. She is an NJ State-certified social studies teacher. Kristen has worked as a volunteer at a National Park site, in the education department of a metropolitan zoo, and as a high school history teacher.

Happy Educating,

Carla

Have you seen HEEP? It is a preschool homeschool curriculum! Learn more here!

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