Genius Christmas STEM Activities
24 Days of Christmas STEM Activities – Countdown to Christmas with our list of holiday STEM projects for hands on learning.
Christmas is coming and the kids are getting EXCITED! To keep them focused and motivated young scientists during this crazy time of year, I’ve put together 24 days of fun Christmas STEM Activities. This idea was a HUGE hit in October as we counted down to Halloween, so we are doing it again with a Christmas STEM Activities countdown. It’s kind of like a STEM Advent Calendar of learning for the month of December! I’ve gathered up lots of cool science, tech, math and engineering activities to keep little ones busy. I even pulled out a couple of chemistry projects that my son is super excited about. I hope you enjoy our 24 Days of Christmas STEM Activities and it inspires your young scientists this holiday season!
Christmas STEM Challenges for Inspired Learning
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NOTE: This list started with 24 activities in a type of STEM Advent Calendar but over time we have gathered so many cool Christmas STEM ideas it has grown like crazy and now includes way more than 24 activities to inspire you this holiday season.
Instead of organizing by date, I decided to organize by type of activity. That way you can pick and chose what works best for you. Enjoy!
Christmas Science Activities
Christmas Thaumatropes – In this STEAM activity kids build Thaumatropes, a traditional toy that explores the amazing science of optical illusions. This build includes creating a stand for the Thaumatropes so they can be displayed and enjoyed by everyone in a classroom or as an interactive Christmas decoration.
Crystal Wreaths – Create gorgeous ornaments that twinkle and sparkle on the tree using simple bits of garland and an easy science experiment using borax. This same technique can be used to make crystal candy canes.
Turkey Races – Christmas and Thanksgiving STEM fun as you explore physics in this activity that all ages love! Guaranteed giggles, fun and learning!
Rudolph Races – A balloon physics challenge that kids of all ages love. Have a blast building and setting off your Rudolph to see who wins the race to save Christmas. Ready, set, make the reindeer fly in this reindeer STEM challenge!
Christmas Slime – Making and playing with slime is a fantastic way to explore polymers while also providing kids with a fun, brain break during the hectic holiday season.
Snowy Winter Science – This is a fantastic way to use chemistry to make snowy projects for your homeschool or science loving kids.
Candy Cane Play Dough Soap & Bubble Bath – Make your own play dough soap and bubble bath using a very simple process even young kids can do. Scented with peppermint and shaped like candy canes these make a wonderful activity for the season.
Christmas Optical Illusions Agamograph – We are really enjoying exploring our senses right now, and this Christmas printable STEAM activity has some illusions that are going to play games with your eyes! Can you believe what you are seeing?
Simple Snow Science – The best part of Christmas is when it’s a white Christmas with lots of snow. This simple science activity explores the properties of the white fluffy stuff. This is such a fun science experiment that will wow the kids.
Salt Dough Ornaments – This traditional crafting activity includes some really cool science to ensure your salt dough ornament recipe turns out perfect. Fantastic for making holiday keepsakes.
Christmas Chemistry Activities
Christmas Bath Bombs – We are OBSESSED with making bath bombs right now and Christmas is the perfect time for this fun chemistry lesson. The results make amazing gifts! Here are some of our favourites! Grinch’s Heart Bath Bomb, Winter Storm Icicle Bath Bomb, Candy Cane Bath Bomb and more to come!
Milk Plastic Christmas Ornament Project – Milk plastic chemistry is the first step in this process to make extremely durable, beautiful ornaments. Start by making your very own plastic using items you have in your kitchen right now!
Bioplastic Christmas Ornaments – After making milk plastic ornaments, try your hand at these bioplastic ornaments using items in your pantry. The clear plastic results look gorgeous with the Christmas lights!
Christmas Tree Chemistry – This Christmas STEAM Challenge was so much fun and love making their Christmas tree creations erupt! I love that this activity brings in a little art to our STEM work.
Simple Christmas Chemistry – This activity is so easy and so fun! Kids will love doing this erupting science and exploring the chemical reactions of baking soda and vinegar with a festive twist.
Winter Play Dough – This is a great project making your own play dough so kids can learn about polymers then enjoy some wonderful sensory play with their gorgeous wintery play dough.
Christmas Candy Science
Sweet STEM Candy Science – Want to try something that will really get kids excited about chemistry? Try some Candy Science and learn about the chemistry behind candy making while making irresistibly delicious candies like caramels, fudge, lollipops and more! The sweet treats are perfect for the holiday season and success in this science lab is soooo sweet!
Christmas Fudge – Learn about sugar science with this delicious and fun fudge making project for the holidays.
Christmas Math Activities
Snowman Math Logic Puzzles – These Sudoku inspired puzzles are a great way for kids to build math, logic and critical thinking skills. All with a festive snowman look!
Grow A Christmas Tree Math Game – This fun math game will be perfect for a snowy afternoon while we sit around drinking hot chocolate, having some fun and learning too!
Snowflake Symmetry – Understanding symmetry is an important skill in math and the holidays are a great time to practice these skills. In this activity symmetry is studied with snowflakes.
Math Garland Christmas Countdown – I love this idea! It’s like a math advent calendar. Perfect for the season!
Christmas STEM Coding and Math Secret Reveals – In this activity kids use coding and graphing skills to reveal a secret holiday image! Put math, coding and art skills to work in this fun activity!
Christmas Technology, Coding and Circuits
Christmas Tree STEM – Glow Salt Circuit – This simple circuit project has major wow factor! Create a Christmas tree with different colour glows that also lights and LED “star” at the top of your tree. Easy to adapt to other designs to suit your holiday STEM needs!
Christmas Stop Motion Card Project – Learn how to do Stop Motion Animation with our easy step by step directions and make a card for the holidays.
Christmas Keyboard Ornament – Got a kid that loves to tinker and a few old keyboards around? Why not use those old keyboards in this tinkering activity that has kids tearing apart old keyboards to explore the inner workings, then using the keys to create a one of a kind ornament.
Circuit-Tree – This is a great challenge for the older kids and is a holiday twist on our popular Circuit Bugs activity. Create their own clothespin circuit Christmas tree that lights up!
Holiday Coding Challenge – Enjoy this fun decoder challenge that also teaches compound words. It’s free for all members of the STEAM Powered Family and you can grab the full package which includes a decoder challenge for every season in our store.
Christmas Bell Binary Key Chain – Love this fun activity that kids can do to create key chains with secret messages coded into them with binary code. What a fantastic gift idea!
Christmas Decoder Ornaments – A fun early coding activity that also builds early reading skills, this Christmas Ornament Decoding Challenge is a fantastic classroom activity. Free Christmas Printable included.
Christmas Engineering Challenges
Tinsel Toss Christmas Catapult Challenge – This is such a fun project! Kids love building catapults and in this STEM challenge they can use their catapult to decorate a tree, but be careful, this project comes with an extra challenge kids will need to overcome.
Spinning Snowflake Card STEM Craft – This WOW worthy activity has kids engineering cool cards for the holidays that spin when they are opened. Kids learn engineering and physics as they create their Spinning Snowflake Holiday Card.
Ice Lantern Engineering – These lanterns are gorgeous and so much fun to make. The perfect outdoor decor to welcome your guests.
Build Tinkering Trees – Using nuts and bolts to build a tree? I know my boys are going to go crazy for this activity! Tinkering with those kinds of items is always fun and this will be a great way to spend an afternoon.
Build a 3D Paper Ornament – Embrace Arts, Maths and Engineering with these easy and fun paper ornament projects. Free template included. This is a fantastic classroom activity.
Build a 3D Standing Christmas Tree Card – These Christmas Cards are so cool and so much fun to build with our free printable template. Customize it by colouring it and address it to your loved ones. Kids will love gifting these cool creations they engineered.
Build a Gingerbread House – This classic activity is actually a fantastic way to practice some engineering. To keep things simple you can grab a kit from the store, but if you want to work in some extra math and kitchen science, why not make the gingerbread from scratch along with the glue and icing. You can even make some of the candy decorations from scratch.
The Final Christmas STEM Activity
And we will wrap up our 24 days by spending the final day with the best Christmas STEM activity of them all! We will be tracking Santa’s progress around the world! My boys love following him on Norad. Even though my oldest is no longer a believer, he still enjoys seeing the names of all the different places in the world and calculating how much longer until Santa arrives at our house!
It’s a great way to countdown those final moments.
Happy Holidays!
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