Jingle Bells

Preschool Activities
Jingle Bells happens to be one of my little man's favorite Christmas songs.  For today's activity, I set out a few pipe cleaners and lots of little bells.  At first he just wanted to shake the bells along with our Christmas music.  Then I showed him how to thread the bells onto the pipe cleaners to make "jingle sticks".   As he filled a few pipe cleaners with bells, I twisted them into a little wreath shape.  At least one of these wreaths ended up on the tree.  The others, he has proudly carried around, making music all afternoon.  This activity turned out to be great fine motor practice and occupied his attention for quite some time.  

Instead of a coloring page, I printed a few pages from 3 Dinosaurs' Christmas Pack.  We read There Was an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Bell and then little man did the two piece puzzles.  I also printed the memory cards; maybe we'll talk big brothers into a game of memory later.

Family Activities
My school aged boys simply could not participate in a Jingle Bells activity without singing Jingle Bells, Batman smells...  So I challenged them to write out a few variations to the usual lyrics, and reminded them to keep it appropriate.  Here's what they came up with:

Jingle Bells, I like to yell,
And run outside each day!

Jingle Bells, Ace likes to eat, 
Lets give him a treat!
(Ace is our dog)

Jingle Bells, I play drums,
I'm learning every day.


This video is just fun and gave us a chance to talk about different kinds of service (raising money for charity and making someone smile):

 

Service Activities
Volunteer to be a bell ringer for charity this season.  Or add your spare change to the bucket.

Snacks
Red and green bell peppers with some babybel cheese wheels.

Before preparing today's snack, I held up the green pepper and asked the kids how they thought it got its name.  They guessed it had to do with the shape of the pepper (which is correct) and the seeds inside that were like little ringers (which is incorrect, but I liked their thoughtful idea).
 




Songs
Jingle Bells
Silver Bells
Bells Will be Ringing
Carol of the Bells
I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day
 
Books
The Bells of Christmas, by Virginia Hamilton
The Christmas Bell, by Rolf Krenzer
There Was an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Bell, by Lucille Colandro