Posted in Christmas Books

Another unit that I put together for my girls was on the Nutcracker. I had originally had this in my plans for December, but their ballet school is going to see the Nutcracker on a field trip on Nov. 30th, so we are going to work on this unit the last week of November.

HERE is the unit on homeschool share site. There are several versions to this story - a lot actually! I have about 4 on my shelf and I know there are quite a few more! I hope to compare and contrast this book throughout the week. I have one that is a bit longer that we may use as a chapter book. We will learn a little bit about the history of ballet this week as well.

Also, during this week we will be learning about Tchaikovsky and his music.

HERE is a great site with information for children on composers and classical music.

While learning about Tchaikovsky, we will be listening to the Classical Kids story called Tchaikovsky Comes to America. If you are familiar with Beethoven Lives Upstairs, this is the same company. Their products are awesome for children! When I taught music at the Christian School last year, we listened to this one on Beethoven and the younger kids as well as the older ones enjoyed listening.

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One of my favorite Christmas books that is all for FUN is The Polar Express. I used to read this book each year to my kindergarten classes...and now that there is a movie, it is even more exciting! There are some fabulous ideas online to go with this book...

HERE is one of many units written for this book.

Lots of classroom teachers post their ideas online for having a pajama party to watch this movie at school. I think this would be a fun thing to do with our friends! (Anyone local that is reading...do you wanna come over in your PJ's, watch the Polar Express and sip hot chocolate together?)

Last year we made a train out of construction paper, glued it on some dark colored paper and  painted snow on our page with q-tips. Painting with q-tips is always a fun craft!

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Santa's Favorite Story is a book that just begs to be read at our house! I love this story! It is from the viewpoint of Santa; he tells all the animals of the forest that Christmas isn't really all about him (Santa) but about someone much more important - JESUS!  I love the illustrations in this story - they are beautiful watercolor pictures. Maybe this would be a good day in December to bring out the watercolor paints and see if we can paint a Santa?

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I also love learning new Christmas carols with the kids each  year! I can remember 2 years ago Emily was 2 1/2 and she was obsessed with the manger! We had learned Away in a Manger and she was just the cutest thing singing that song and carrying around the manger from our nativity set!

A beautiful book about a beloved Christmas carol is Silent Night, with illustrations by Thomas Kinkade. This is one of those books I picked up and just could not put down because of the beautiful illustrations! The pages of this book go through each line of the Christmas carol with beautiful pictures to go along with it. Maybe this will be *the* carol we work on this year along with some of the words in sign language.  We will also listen to various versions of this beautiful song.

HERE is a site where you can listen (on midi) to Silent Night. It also has a history of this song, written by Joseph Mohr, for you to read. It is a neat story! The melody we are most familiar with was written by Franz Gruber.

Did you know there is a Silent Night museum over in Salzburg? I didn't either! Check it out if you wish!

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If you have preschoolers and kindergartners in your home, you should check out My Birthday, Jesus Birthday by Holly Davis. I LOVE this book! It is written on such a wonderful level for these younger kids! Each page tells something about us and then something about Jesus. How we celebrate birthdays, how we celebrate Jesus birthday...the nice places we were born (for the most part) and the stable where Jesus was born...grandparents being excited over our births, the wisemen coming from afar to see baby Jesus. It is a really neat book! I love to read this book along with a Happy Jesus Birthday party that we do each year. Bake a cake together and sing happy birthday to our Blessed Savior!

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The Friendly Beasts is a book that goes through the words of an old English Christmas Carol. This particular version is illustrated by Tomie DePaola and I love the simple pictures in this book! Elizabeth Foss mentions a cute way to do copywork for this book...either copy a picture of each of the animals from this story, or have the children draw each animal. And under each animal write that animal's verse from the song. The song goes through the donkey carrying the mother up to Bethlehem, the cow giving Him the manger for a bed, the sheep giving Him wool for a blanket, and the dove cooing Him to sleep.  

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Another Christmas book by Tomie DaPaola is Country Angel Christmas. This one is another cute story about 3 smaller angels not knowing what they can give the newborn King because they are so small. This is a great book to use as a reminder that we can ALL be cheerful givers no matter how big or small we are!

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Well, that about wraps up the 2nd edition of Christmas books from my shelf. Looking at my pile, I think I can get all the remaining books in 1 more post...so be watching for the 3rd and final post on Christmas books I love. I do hope to continue to find and add crafts or activities for some of the books where I don't have one yet...so please feel free to share your ideas too!

Don't you just love listening to that Christmas music playing while looking through all these fabulous Christmas books? I LOVE CHRISTMAS!