Teaching Holidays in the Classroom:

How to be More Inclusive This Season

With the holiday season upon us, festivity is in the air! Celebrating holidays in the classroom can be exciting, but it’s also crucial to consider inclusivity. Creating a welcoming classroom environment is key to helping your students feel comfortable. Your classroom can be a space where everyone is represented and their family traditions can be celebrated. We have provided a few ways to be more inclusive this holiday season.

Celebrate All Holidays Equally

The first step to creating an inclusive classroom is understanding and acknowledging all major holidays. Once you have all of the important dates on your calendar this holiday season, you’ll have a better understanding of how to celebrate and represent your students in an authentic way.

During the winter time, Christmas is often favored over most holidays. In a classroom, it’s important to acknowledging holidays equally and not have an emphasis on just one. One way to do this is through classroom decorations. Putting up decorations to represent a variety of holidays will help make your students feel equally represented.

Understand Traditions

Many of your students come from homes with unique traditions. Another way of being more inclusive is knowing and asking about those traditions. You can incorporate ways for students to learn more about each other and for you to learn about them. Activities and lessons can include creating a collage that represents students’ family or religion, creating get-to-know-you-questions and having lessons surrounding the traditions and holidays that your students celebrate.

Introducing the idea of rituals and traditions into your classroom is another way to get students thinking about the influence of different cultures. The goal is for students to have a better understanding of traditions and how they can impact their own or their classmate’s values and routines.

Promote Giving

Besides celebrating holidays, this season is also dedicated to giving. Teaching the significance of philanthropy will help create a more inclusive and kind-hearted environment for your students. It’s important for kids to learn how to give back. The goal is to encourage kindness and thoughtfulness in your classroom.

You can encourage giving in several ways, but you can begin by teaching the importance of philanthropy. Another option is offering ways to get involved, such as volunteering with a charitable organization. There are a lot of ways to dedicate time to philanthropy, especially during the season of giving!

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