The Christmas season is upon us and I am having such a BLAST getting into the holiday spirit! My students recently created the most adorable Christmas tree window decorations and they bring so much holiday cheer into my classroom. I just had to share a tutorial of my newest holiday project with you!
If you're a Kinder-Craze follower, you probably already know of my long-standing obsession with tissue paper window decorations. The Catholic teacher in me loves how they look like stained glass windows. The craftaholic in me loves that they require only the simplest of materials to create.
For this project, I wanted to use traditional Christmas colors. I used green tissue paper (in two shades) as the filler of the tree but I wanted the red to pop in a big way. I took out my trusty star-shaped paper punch and started punching through red bulletin board paper (the cheap stuff your school probably carries that is red on both sides.) I love the bulletin board paper because it is opaque enough to stand out against the green tissue paper, but still allows a lot of light to shine through it.
(Also, paper punches do NOT like to cut through tissue paper.)
I have had my star punch for several years and I am not sure where it came from but I found a similar star punch on Amazon.
I always prep the work stations for the students in my class while they are away from their desks playing or out of the classroom at a specials class. The project is simple to prep - it just takes a little time. To prep, peel a sheet of clear contact paper (approximately 9"x12") and place it sticky-side-up on each child's desk. Place a black Christmas tree frame (download a free template) in the center of each contact paper sheet. Place tissue paper and star cutouts in containers that are easily within reach of all students.
That's it! The students do the rest of the work!
Have students begin with the stars. My kindergarten students each put 5 stars on their tree. Once the stars were complete, the children filled in the rest of the trees with two different shades green tissue paper squares.
There are always a few students that are in a rush and will say that they are finished while their Christmas tree is still half-empty. I tell those students that they need to keep adding more pieces of tissue paper until I can no longer see their desk peeking up through the tree.
This student put the finishing touches on his tissue paper Christmas tree.
Once the tree is completely filled with stars and tissue paper, I always "seal" the project by placing another sheet of clear contact paper sticky-side-down on the back of the tree. That way, there is plastic coating on both sides and I don't have stray pieces of tissue paper all over my classroom.
Each student carefully trimmed the excess plastic from their own Christmas trees.
Student names are recorded on their trees with a black Sharpie and the trees are hung in the classroom windows with clear Scotch tape.
I love, love, LOVE how cute and festive our Christmas trees look.
You can easily make tissue paper Christmas trees to decorate the windows in your home or classroom too! Download a free Christmas tree template to get started!
Happy Holidays!