G is for Gingerbread

Last week was gingerbread week in our classroom. The theme provided us with a fun week of activities that helped the transition between Thanksgiving and Christmas.

There are so many different versions of the classic Gingerbread Man that we never lacked for enough literature!

We started the unit with The Gingerbread Man illustrated by Karen Schmidt. 

It's a classic take on a classic story with the Gingerbread Man meeting a very sticky end on the end of a fox's nose! 

During literacy centers, I designed a glyph in which they created a gingerbread man of their own.

We added a little glue and some sparkles then hung them up to dry.

One of the centers I designated as "The bakery." I put out gingerbread boy and girl cookie cutters and ginger and cinnamon scented play-do, which I made using a basic play-do recipe with lots and lots of spices mixed in. It smelled good enough to eat, but came with a stern warning not to!

I provided googly eyes and beads for decorations. They had a great time creating their Ginger people and were pretty impressed that their hands smelled like Christmas for the rest of the day.

About mid-week I read The Gingerbread Baby by Jan Brett. 

I love this story, mostly because it ends happily with the little Gingerbread Baby living happily in his own little gingerbread house and not in a fox's belly.

Later, I created a graph in which I asked, "Which Gingerbread Story did you like best?

I gave each child a small gingerbread cut out with their name on it and asked them to place their gingerperson on the graph.

Gingerbread Baby won by a landslide!

We finished the unit by creating our own gingerbread houses. 

The day before I collected empty milk cartons from the lunch room and rinsed them well. 

We used cinnamon graham crackers for the sides. A little glob of frosting is just enough to glue the graham crackers to the milk carton.

We used canned frosting, but next time I will definitely make my own. Home made is a little big stiffer and stickier, where the canned stuff tends to be a little too slippery.

It did eventually work with a little perseverance, but it was a little frustrating for little fingers.

I provided, star mints, gumdrops and red cinnamon hearts to stick to the graham crackers.

The most difficult part of this was keeping their frosting covered fingers out of their mouths!

The kids were so proud of their sweet creations...and so was I!