My Christmas Five Senses Book for Preschool and Kindergarten

Let the preschoolers explore their senses through art and literacy while making this Christmas five senses book. Be sure to grab the free printable at the bottom of this post.

How to Make a Christmas Five Senses Book

For those of you new to Fun-A-Day, I’ve been in early childhood education since 2001. For almost all of my teaching career, I have LOVED book making with my students.

Very simple emergent readers work well with them, of course, and I use my fair share of those.

About 3 or 4 times a year, though, I enjoy making more in-depth books with the kids. These books include the children’s arts and crafts, along with printed words.

This Christmas five senses book is one I’ve used for the majority of my teaching career, in both kindergarten and preschool. Every time, the children have such a blast making it and reading it!

Don’t forget, you can grab a free printable copy of the book’s words and cover at the bottom of this post.

Below are directions for how I made the Christmas five senses book in 2013. I tend to change up the art/crafts the kids make for each page, depending on materials we have on hand.

The words are the same each year though. The order of the pages isn’t too important, although I like keeping the “Christmas is love” page at the end. It just seems like a nice closing page!

I’ll share how we made the book as pictured next. I’ll also share a few other ideas and materials you could try.

Five Senses Book Materials

Construction paper (green, red, brown, white)
Mini Christmas cookie cutters
Tempera paint (red, white)
Cotton balls
Wrapping paper
Cinnamon (or other spices like ginger)
Mini candy canes
Mini gingerbread men cookies
Jingle bells
Ribbon
Craft sticks

My Christmas Five Senses Book Front Cover

I had the children use tiny Christmas cookie cutters to decorate the front cover.

They dipped the cookie cutters in white paint, then painted all around the paper. We glued the title down once the paint was dry.

Of course, you can also simply mount the title page to a blank piece of red construction paper. Or give the kids some Christmas stickers to add around the title.

Related: Foam Geoboard Trees

Christmas looks like presents.

First, the kids added the appropriate sentence to the bottom of a piece of green construction paper.

Then, using wrapping paper, the children cut out “presents” and glued them to the page. I noticed many of the kids liked cutting around the animals on the wrapping paper!

You can have the children add Christmas present stickers to the page, as an alternative. Or have the kids use a stamp and some washable ink pads to the page.

Christmas feels like Santa’s beard.

The children placed the sentence strip at the bottom of a piece of green construction paper first.

I used D.J. Inkers’ Santa clip art to create a little coloring paper. The kids colored Santa however they wanted, then glued cotton balls on for his beard. We had some very colorful Santas!

In past years, I had the children create Santa with a construction paper circle for the face and a construction paper triangle for his hat. Then the kids added facial features with markers and added cotton balls for the beard.

As an alternative to Santa, you can change the wording to, “Christmas feels like evergreen trees.” Then let the kids paint with a piece of evergreen tree, or simply glue the piece directly to the page. I’ve included this variation in the free printable (available at the bottom of this post).

Christmas smells like gingerbread.

We had a little too much fun with this page of the Christmas five senses book! As with the other pages, the kids first added the sentence to the green construction paper.

Next, using cookie cutters, the kids painted gingerbread men on their paper. Then they sprinkled (or, in some cases, piled) cinnamon on top of the wet paint.

Alternatively, you can have the kids free paint their own gingerbread people on this page. Then have the children add spices (cinnamon, ginger, etc.) to the wet paint.

Stickers or stamps would work as illustrations here, too.

Many years, I also added a small gingerbread man cookie to this page. The kids could smell it when rereading the book (and then have a little treat, too).

Christmas tastes like candy canes.

To start off, the children added the words to the paper.

Then, I gave the kiddos canes cut out of red construction paper. They cut stripes out of white paper, then glued the stripes on how they saw fit.

I then stapled a mini candy cane to the page. We made sure to “sample” candy canes as a class, too!

Children could also paint their own candy canes for this page. Or they could use stamps or stickers.

Christmas sounds like Rudolph’s bell.

The kiddos added the words to the green construction paper first.

Then, the boys and girls used brown triangles and red circles to create Rudolph’s face on their papers. They added eyes and antlers with crayons and markers. As you can see, I didn’t worry about the children making it look exactly like the traditional triangle reindeer.

I decided to hot glue jingle bells to popsicle sticks for the sound of the bell. The sticks also acted like a pointer, so the kids could point to the words as they read. I made a tiny envelope for the jingle bell pointer to stay when they’re not reading. I also attached the pointer to the Rudolph page with glue and a ribbon. The kids seriously loved this part of the book!

You could simply glue some jingle bells to the construction paper Rudolph, or even let the kids paint their own reindeer.

As an alternative to Rudolph, you could have “Christmas sounds like bells.” instead. I included this as a choice in the free printable (you can find it at the bottom of this post).

Christmas is love.

As with all of the pages of the Christmas five senses book, the children glued the words to the paper first.

The kids then used their hands to make a heart shape in red paint. Then I cut around the hand prints, and we glued the heart to the last page.

Instead of the hand print heart, the kids could free paint the hearts or add stickers to the page.

Since I worked in a church preschool when we made this version, we were able to talk about God’s love for us in sending Jesus to the earth. This led to a great discussion about how Christmas is about celebrating Jesus’ birthday and His love for us. When I taught in public school, we talked about the love for our friends and family during Christmas.

If you’re not fond of this page, simply leave it out.

Interactive Christmas Five Senses Book

If you want to take this concept and extend it, take a look at Preschool Teacher 101’s Christmas Five Senses Book pack. This 130-page pack includes the following:

Planning Tips
Book List Suggestions
Related Center Suggestions
Emergent Readers (2 versions, both available in 3 variations)
Full-Size Book Option for Class Read Alouds
Sentence Strip Option for DIY Book Making Version
Pocket Charts
Anchor Charts for Class Brainstorming
Art Suggestions for Each Book Page

You can also find it on Teachers Pay Teachers.

Christmas Five Senses Book Freebie

Some of you awesome readers have requested a copy of the printable I originally made for this five senses book. Here you go! The freebie includes the word strips and two options for the front cover of the book. I also added an alternative for the Santa and Rudolph pages.

This free printable is available to members of Fun-A-Day’s free email community. If you’re already a member, click on the button below and enter your information to get the printable sent to your email inbox.

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