Kids love giving and receiving gifts over the holidays, so let’s put some of that enthusiasm into our holiday math activities! What if kids can practice 2D shape recognition and play with gifts at the same time? This Gift Sorting Shapes Activity is a fun math game to add to your Christmas theme activities in preschool and kindergarten. It will help them learn to recognize and sort 2D shapes. Use it for math centers or during math small group instruction.
GET A FULL WEEK OF CHRISTMAS THEME ACTIVITIES IN OUR PRINTABLE PRESCHOOL LESSON PLANS
Shape Sorting Gifts Freebie
There are a bunch of different ways to use this Gift Sorting Shapes Activity, and it can easily be adapted to many different learning styles!
Some great ways to play with this activity are:
- For kids who work better with physical objects, try using plastic shape tokens or other flat shape manipulatives.
- Shake things up with a mix of printed photos and physical items to get your advanced students thinking in 3D.
Print out the gift sheets on colored paper for some added fun!
Start with the present sheets lined up across the desk or floor, and let your students match up the shapes with their respective gift boxes until everything is in its place.
If you’d like to make the game self-checking you can add stickers or colored dots on the back of the individual gift pieces. Once kids think they’ve matched all the presents correctly they can flip over the pieces to see if they all match.
RELATED: 25 Shape Books for Kids
For an alternative play activity, find real objects form around your house or classroom that correspond to shapes on the mats, and use them as manipulatives instead of the printed photos!
No matter how you play, this Gift Sorting Shapes Activity is sure to put a smile on your students’ faces as they learn and practice shapes and daydream of giving and receiving gifts this holiday season!
Get the free printable Shape Sorting Gifts Freebie
This free printable includes:
- Six shape present mats
- 4 pages of full-color shape items
- Directions for how to play
Complete the form below to get your freebie.
GET A FULL SET OF CHRISTMAS THEME PRESCHOOL ACTIVITIES
The 169-page Christmas Lesson Plan Set includes hands-on activities and these additional printables:
1) Beginning Letters Gift Sorting Game (in color and b/w)
2) Reindeer Math Mats (2 versions in color and b/w)
3) My Christmas Senses Activity Book Making Pieces
4) 0-35 Christmas Number Cards (2 versions in color and b/w)
5) Christmas Counting Syllables Sorting Game (in color and b/w)
6) Christmas Picture-Word Cards (in color and b/w)
7) Ornament Play Dough Mats
8) Candy Cane Play Dough Writing Task Cards (shapes, uppercase letters, lowercase letters, number 0-20)
9) Christmas Light Patterns Activity Pieces (in color and b/w)
Also available on Teachers Pay Teachers.
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