Materials
- Polar Express by Chris Van Allsburg
- hot chocolate mix, cups, and spoons
- small silver bells (one for each child)
- ribbon
What to do
1. Send a note home to parents asking them to let their child wear pajamas to school on the designated Polar Express Day. Teachers should wear pajamas, too!
2. When the children arrive at school, read the book Polar Express. Have a variety of activities in each center that relate to the story.
3. Set up a table for making and tasting hot cocoa. Supply this center with cocoa mix, cups, plastic spoons, and mini marshmallows. Have an adult help with the hot water.
4. Using the chairs in the room, set up a pretend train. Encourage the children to dramatize the story.
5. Let the children make snowy pictures in the Art Station. Put out black or blue paper and white chalk. Use a die-cut machine or scissors to cut out trains. Encourage the children to glue the trains on the paper and add "snow" using chalk.
6. Present each child with a silver bell on a piece of pretty ribbon as a keepsake of your Polar Express Day.
-Gail Morris, Kemah, TX
