Gingerbread Houses

Every year, this day in 2nd grade, is a day where 

MEMORIES ARE MADE!

It's one of our finest building days of the year!!

Every year, we build gingerbread houses with our parents!

All through the week, prior to the BIG BUILDING DAY, we were busy little crafters with TONS of Gingerbread Activities in small group learning, read alouds, & whole group activities!
 

I use SO MUCH from my unit, all through the week, that there is literally, too much for me to use. 

I could use this for a minimum of 2 weeks.

I'd rather have too many activities on hand, to filter through, pick & choose from, change here to there, do what I want,  

then to NOT have enough activities on hand for the kids to do!
Apart from all the COMMON CORE GALORE activity pages (37 pages total, everything from math to reading comp. to language), are step by step directions on how to build a REAL gingerbread house either at home, or with your class.
To see all the COMMON CORE GALORE activities, click HERE.

Here's The HOW-TO On The Gingerbread House Building:

From the unit, we start out with a contribution item letter, where each child brings in one item to contribute for the event.

Here's what the GREAT kids & parents contributed:

Then, my job was to divide it all up into kids' baggies.

The prep work is a LIFESAVER I tell ya!
I highly recommend it!

We took the graham crackers from here:

...and cut 2 triangles for each child.
(stale graham crackers cut better than fresh ones, 
I have not-so-easily learned)
Then we cut whole graham crackers to halves, 
and gave 6 halves to each child.

Per child, a grand total of:
2 triangles
6 halves 

And the frosting from here:

to here, where this is the BEST glue frosting to hold all the heavy candies children love to pile on their houses!
It's funny, I tell the kids, this is the glue for your houses...
and they still want to eat it.

Regular little popsicle sticks are the best frosters EVER!

 My little sweetie helper was so happy with herself, as she laid the frosting cups into arrays for multiplication we just learned about:



Finally, all was set, including our Chef hats, along with everything else possible needed to be set & ready to roll!
Now all we need, are the wonderful parent helpers to join us!


As these great parents joined in, the building began!
We used empty milk cartons from our hot lunches, as a foundation under our houses to stand upon to be well built & solid.
It's a great trick if you can use them!




Then we keep constructing along, listening to Mickey Mouse Christmas music, the kids & parents are singing along to Goofy, all was merry in Mrs. Howbert's room!

Our FABULOUS LITTLE CHEFS, & their 
GINGERBREAD HOUSES:











To see how we made Chef Hats, click HERE.


We ended with a fun Smart Cookie on How To Build Gingerbread Houses, since we are experts now...smile, smile:






All from,


This is truly, one of the BEST days in 2nd grade,
where our families join in for some holiday crafting,
where memories are made & never forgotten!

These days are, PRICELESS!
Merry Christmas!