Oh Christmas Tree!

I didn't get a chance to make any Christmas trees with the children this year, other than the handprint one we created for the December bulletin board. I have made some trees in previous years. I hope you can understand these as I don't have many pictures.

The first one was very simple. First I let the children paint a Christmas tree with green paint on a large 12 x 18 piece of paper. The next day I raided the closet to find anything I could use for decorations: sequins, yarn, buttons, stickers, pom poms, pipe cleaners, etc. I used tacky glue as this helps hold these types objects better. Then I just let the children use their imaginations and decorate their tree.

For the second tree you will need:

green construction paper

scissors

hole puncher

tissue paper

glue

stickers

This tree consisted of folding a 9 x 12 piece of green construction paper. Draw a Christmas tree pattern against the fold. Allow the children to cut out the tree, leave the fold in tact--you want to be able to open the tree, but not have it fall apart. Give the children a hole puncher and let them punch hole in the tree shape, through both sides at once. Now open the tree and let them put glue on one side of the inside of the tree. Give them tissue paper squares, or one piece of tissue paper and put it over the holes--like Christmas lights. Next, put an outline of glue around the edge of the inside of the tree--fold it over and glue the sides together. We then gave them stickers to decorate around the lights. Hang this up on a window and watch the lights glow.