A Bundle of Drama Activities for Christmas!

Drama and Christmas! Does it get any more fun? Easy to prep, making your life so much easier at this crazy time of year, bring out the risk taking, creativity in your young actors this Christmas holiday season with these fun activities for reading and fluency. Each reader's theatre script comes complete with easy prep. props, which are entirely optional, so you can have a full blown Oscar worthy performance! With elf hats, reindeer antlers and speech bubbles, let the children decide how to perform these Christmas tales. Perfect for literacy groups with 8-12 in the cast.

The Nose Glows Readers' Theatre with Props: The script is designed for 3rd-5th grade. With a focus on the well known song about Rudolph the red-nosed reindeer, this drama will reinforce the children’s understanding as well as reading fluency.

The performance takes approximately 12 minutes once rehearsed. The props are easy to print and go, with simple preparation involving nothing more than construction paper, scissors and glue, if you wish.

When Santa Got Stuck Up the Chimney Reader's Theatre with Props: This script is designed for 3rd-5th grade. With a focus on the traditional American poem, Twas the Night Before Christmas and the song, ‘Santa Got Stuck Up the Chimney” this drama will reinforce the children’s understanding of the poetry as well as reinforcing reading fluency. It includes a close reading exercise in preparation for reading the script.

I have also had the children identify the theme or moral of the tale and added their own ending to the play.

The performance takes approximately 15 minutes once rehearsed.

Bring this engaging and funny reading activity into your classroom and enjoy the kiddos’ creativity.

The Tale of the Giant Snowman Drama Circle: These printable cards are just one of my drama circle activities that I use to practice the ATL skills of cooperation, communication and thinking to name a few. One card begins the round and each child has to act out the instructions on their card, following on from the previous card. It is great for literacy centers activities as well as cooperative group work.

This drama was designed for my 3rd, 4th and 5th graders as a fun review of the speaking and listening strands. The theme is around a story of working together to create a giant snowman, with lots of humour added.

Simply gather the children into a seated circle, shuffle the cards and distribute a card to each child. The start card leads the way and the children have to read their own instructions on their card and then listen and look for the actions and words from the acting of each person so that they know when to take their turn. This is developing listening and observational skills as well as communication, presentation and thiking skills. Not every card requires speaking; some ask only for miming. The stars marked with a gold star are less wordy and better to use with struggling readers or ELL kids. I usually review the card with these kids prior to the circle.

There are 24 cards within this packet, an instruction card and title card for your centers if you wish. I have also included additional blank cards for your own use. The drama cards can be used for 4th-6th grade and used within a whole class scenario or smaller groups, where the children are given several task cards to read and act from.

The concept of drama circles I a great ice-breaking activity or a fun review of the IB skills. It works well as a refresher of the ATL skills prior to the Exhibition also.

Take a look at the other hilarious scripts below. And also other fun, drama circles are found here.

•Teddy Bears’ Halloween Picnic

•Pilgrims in A Pickle – A Thanksgiving Tale

•Peter and the Wolf

•The Gingerbread Boy

•The Nose Glows – Rudolph the Reindeer’s Story

You can find out many more tips and tools for the inquiry-based classroom in my blog, PYPteachingtools.com

Enjoy!

Susan Powers