Homemade Penguin Christmas Countdown Calendar!

Children sometimes have a hard time keeping track of days - especially if there is an exciting event on the way! Instead of fielding the question - "How many more days till Christmas?" - twenty times a day, help your students make their own countdown calendars with this cute craft from Craft Elf! With just a few tweaks, your students will be able to complete this project with ease!

Supplies You'll Need

• Wonderfoam® sheets in assorted colors
• Velcro dots
• Yarn
• School glue

Using card stock, create several penguin templates with which your students can trace and cut out their own penguin shapes from Wonderfoam® sheets. They'll use black for the body and head, white for the belly and eyes, and orange for the beak and feet.

Next, provide students with a Christmas light bulb template. They'll use this to trace and cut bulb shapes from assorted colors of Wonderfoam® (i.e. yellow, orange, red, blue, green, purple, etc.). Using a white paint pen, have students script a number (one through twenty-four) on each bulb.

Invite students to glue a piece of yarn across the penguin's body in a zig zag fashion (see the example craft at Craft Elf). When dry, provide students with Velcro dots,  encouraging them to place one half of each dot on the back of the Christmas bulbs and the other half along the yarn on the penguin (when the bulbs are velcroed to the yarn, it will look like a string of Christmas lights).

Have students match up the bulbs to each Velcro dot on the line - putting the bulbs in order from one to twenty-four. Help them hang the craft in their locker or invite them to take the countdown calendars home to share with their families. Starting December 1st the countdown begins! [Reminder: Students won't need to remove a light bulb until the 2nd though.] While it's fun for the students to have their own calendars, make sure there's a countdown classroom calendar too!

Penguin Count down to Christmas