Decorate the Christmas Tree Activity with ABCs

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My kids had such a fun time with this Christmas tree activity! They didn’t even know they were learning.

My neighbor came over after we were doing this activity, the boys were so excited to show him it to him and do it all again. He was impressed with how much they were learning beyond even the obvious, all while the kid just thought they were playing and decorating a Christmas tree for fun!

Of course, that’s what I love to do. Create activities for them, let them have fun, and sneak in a little learning without them even knowing it.

I used my handy painter’s tape for this activity. But a new kind! I discovered green painter’s tape! That’s an affiliate link that will help support hands on : as we grow at no extra cost to you if you decide to purchase.

I found that tape after chatting with my friend Sarah of How Wee Learn after she showed me a similar activity she did. Instead of learning upper and lowercase letter like we decided to try, her kids learned patterning and counting.

Find more move and learn activities using tape here.

The green painter’s tape was perfect for making a Christmas tree. I kept it simple. Instead of an outline, I made zigzags across, much like a garland.

To make it easier, I first taped a triangle for the outline of the tree and then filled in the zigzag, so I knew I was staying somewhat proportional. I reused the outline as I was going so I didn’t waste too much.

I made ornaments from cardstock paper. I just chose a few colorful papers and cut circles from each.

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I wrote uppercase letters on the ornaments. I didn’t end up with the whole alphabet, only to T.

On the Christmas tree, I wrote lowercase letters. I decided to write the lowercase letters in order, from the top of the tree going down to the bottom. That way if George got stuck, we could sing the alphabet together to walk along and find it.

On the back of the ornaments, I rolled and stuck on a piece of painter’s tape to make it sticky. I then mixed them all up in a pile. Later on when we did it again, we stuck the ornaments to the wall for them to find and match as they decorated the tree.

I also added a yellow star for the top of the tree! We actually had this on hand from the Christmas Advent calendar we have going right now. Someday I’ll have to share that with you too. I’m just not quick enough!

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George grabbed an ornament and told me the letter. He knows his uppercase letters pretty well now.

Then he’d walk along the tree, looking for the lowercase letter. Some were easy. Some were really tricky for him and we sang the ABC song to find it.

It was so exciting for him to watch the Christmas tree come to life with the colorful ornaments! He got more and more excited the more ornaments he added.

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Its not just about the upper and lowercase letters. This can be transformed into any type of learning activity.

If you want to learn counting. Put dots on the ornaments and write numbers on the tree to match. You could do the same with addition problems.

If you want to learn sight words, write words in both places for them to match.

If you want to learn beginning letter sounds you could cut out pictures from magazines and tape them on the ornaments to match up to letters on the tree.

It can go on and on.

Be sure to also check out this giant Christmas tree decorating activity from Happy Hooligans that’s perfect for toddlers to get creative during the holidays!