It's that time of year again when you can involve your class in all sorts of great art and craft activities to make your classroom look amazing and then please all the Mum's and Dad's by sending home some wonderful home made decorations for the festive season.

I have made these Christmas Paper Baubles from gold, silver and black paper before, but here they are shown using patterned wrapping paper, any combination of papers will look great and you can make them to a coloured theme if you want to. For a simple card Christmas Bauble, try these photo Baubles, which may be especially fun to look at when they are bought out in the coming years to put on the tree.

Watch this clear video with a picture film, with music sound track, of how to make a 3D Christmas tree. For older children use this more complicated 3D Origami Christmas tree. You could show the film on the interactive whiteboard and keep pausing it, until everyone is ready for the next section.

These cup snowmen look quite cool, but I think you would need to work out how best to do the hat melting part (which requries putting cups in the oven), depending on your children and school equipment. I would have to melt them at home first. For a more straight forward Snowman try these ones made from paper plates.

A great whole class decoration is this handprint wreath, that combines the handprints of each child in one large decoration. For instructions for a traditional Christmas paper lantern, scroll down a little on this page. Or for that traditional favourite of tissue paper stained glass window decorations find the instructions here.

Try just one of these idea and your classroom will look great!

There are so many different spelllings for Hanukkah (Chanukah), and no one seems to know which one is officially correct! Anyway,  if you or the children in your class celebrate this Jewish festival, then have a look at these cards, which are all suitable to attempt in the classroom.

For older Key Stage 2 children Enchanted learning have a great Star of David card, which requires very few materials, but looks really effective. This fold out Menorah card design can be customised and personalised quite easily. Look at this clear instruction video for a Star of David wreath or lollipop stick decoration or a handprint Menorah card. This site has clear picture instructions for a chunky Chanukah candle or try this Pop up Dreidel card.

Happy Hanukkah!

Youtube and other video websites are fast becoming great places to look for ideas for making things. However, you can end up watching quite a bit of unsuitable content first if you are trying to find something instructional and suitable for showing to children. So to save you wasting time and watching a lot of unsuitable content, here are some great videos with instructions for Christmas cards for the class to make, some videos suitable for showing direct to children or some that will give you ideas that you can take and then teach yourself.

Apples4theteacher have uploaded this video of a great Rudolph reindeer card, which is clear and easy to follow. If you like 3D cards, try this Christmas Tree card. The instructions are visual and clear, but set to music, with no verbal instructions and are suitable for older children as the card requires the use of a craft knife. Another card, this time suitable for all primary children, with music background and visual instructions is this pop up Snowman in Christmas Trees card which is really straightforward to make. Fast forward the adverts to get to the clear instructions for this  Pop up Snowman, which has clear spoken instructions or this easy Christmas Present card, an instruction video which you could show straight to the children. 

Whichever one you chose, children all love to make cards at this time of year and their parents and grandparents love to receive a hand made card.

If you're considering telling the Christmas or Nativity story to your class, you don't just have to use a book anymore, although obviously children need to regularly hear those read too. There are a good selection of free Christmas story resources available to use online, so have a look and see which one best suits the age group you are targeting or tells the story in the way you prefer.

Topmarks have a fairly wordy version that will suit older KS1 and KS2 children which has fairly traditional pictures, although these could do with being larger. REonline have a simpler version with childrens' drawings used for illustrations, and comes with sound and would be perfect for KS1 or even Reception children.

Ngfl have a great selection of resources attached to their Christmas story, which can also be used with sound, aimed at KS1, which include Arrange the story, Pairs Games, Question Games, a jigsaw and Think and Discuss activities. You could use this story version which tells the story in simple sections to which you can click and drag pictures and add your own text, which would be great for children to do independently on a PC. For older KS2 children try this Bible story with pictures from book of Luke or try this version telling the story with lots of different Bible verses with simple illustrations.

If you don't have a quality internet connection in the classroom download this colourfully illustrated powerpoint which you can find by scrolling down the page.

It's coming up to that fun time of year again, when it's time to decide on which Advent Calendar to choose to use in the classroom. Northumberland still have a selection of four to chose from, although they have not added a new one in recent years. Woodlands however, appear to have updated theirs, and as usual offer an interesting calendar that is only available from December 1st, so no chance for a sneak preview! Nrich have some great advent calendars with maths related activities, suduko's and problem solving activities behind each door, and their selection caters for a range of ability levels. If you use Smartboard, then try this download which, for me opened as a blank template to which I can add my own pictures or activities, although I think it was meant to open as a ready made calendar! Oh well, still a useful template!

If you prefer a calendar to download on powerpoint, then try the one from Communication4all, which teaches the children something about how Christmas is celebrated in a different country behind each door. Fresherschools also have a downloadable powerpoint calendar which is available in 25 or 31 day versions, which looks very colourful. They also offer a version to which children can add their own clipart and pictures which would make a great ICT activity for KS2 children.

KS1 children can try out all the ICT activities behind the doors of the Kent Advent Calendar, either on the interactive whiteboard, or the classroom PC, or try this one from HelpKidzLearn which is similar. Sparklebox have a printable calendar to download and make, but children would probably find it far more interesting to design and make their own, than just glue together a printable - not much scope for learning there, but the Sparklebox one may be useful as a template or to give the initial idea of how a calendar is made. Activity village also have some good craft ideas on their downloadable calendars.

Enjoy advent!

Fireworks will be lighting our skies to celebrate the traditional Hindu festival of light.

You can have your own virtual fireworks display on your interactive whiteboard, courtesy of Woodlands Junior School. Activity village has a range of craft ideas, colouring pages, printables and puzzles. You can download colour topic vocabulary with pictures from Sparklebox, or their colour word mat. The story of Rama and Sita is available from Ngfl for interactive whiteboard, with other accompanying whiteboard activities, including a pairs game and think and discuss ideas. Black and white outline colouring images can be downloaded here and Kent Ed has an online mehindi painting activity available for younger children. Enjoy Divali in your classroom!