Secondary School News | Ideas for Holiday Fun

justinsayson
Dec 9
3 min read

The holiday break is here! It's a well-deserved rest for our students after a year of hard work. This time is crucial for relaxing, recharging, and reconnecting with family and friends.

However, as you head into the holiday period, make sure that you are being intentional with your approach as the long Christmas break can often be a time where important skills like reading, writing and mathematics take a back seat and thus deteriorate. Some studies indicate that students ‘on average, lost between 25 – 30 percent of their school-year learning over the summer’.

Now, don’t rush out and set thousands of assignments and math problems for your student over the break. Brains do need rest. As in many things, balance is key. Look for fun and natural ways to keep these skills in use and make sure to monitor screen time. Allow opportunities for adventures to museums, parks, libraries. Crack open that holiday reading stash. Build space for creativity.

And as for writing and mathematics. Here are two simple ideas that you could give a try.

Holiday Journal

At the beginning of each week during the break, have your student identify one significant event or experience they would like to "capture." This could be a family dinner, a trip to the city, an afternoon spent playing a new game, or the simple act of baking cookies.

At the end of that week, the student's task is to write a single journal entry about that chosen event. The explicit goal is to move beyond a simple summary of what happened. The entry should instead be a rich, descriptive piece of writing that incorporates details appealing to all five senses:

Sight: What were the precise colors, lighting, or visual details?
Sound: What did they hear? (e.g., specific music, conversation, the wind, the sound of cooking)
Smell: What aromas were in the air? (e.g., pine, baking, cold air)
Taste: If relevant, what were the specific flavors?
Touch: What were the textures? (e.g., the feel of cold glass, a rough sweater, steam from a hot drink)

If you got the whole family involved, then you could also talk through each event/entry together as a family. Did you notice different things? What tends to stand out to each person?

As a bonus, this will help your student remember all the fun things they did over the break.

Christmas Baking

The premise is straightforward. Have your student select a favorite holiday recipe, perhaps for cookies, brownies, or a simple loaf, with the goal of baking a larger batch to be given as gifts to family or friends. To achieve this; first, they’ll need to work out how many people they are baking for and then how many batches of the recipe they will need to bake. If you can, get them to do this without jumping straight to the calculator.

And, naturally, the bonus is delicious baked goods at the end of the process.

Other Ideas

There are so many more ways you can build practical learning into the holidays. To name a few:

Break Out the Board Games: Strategy games are a workout for the prefrontal cortex.
Manage a Gift Budget: Entrusting them with a set amount for purchasing gifts (or supplies to make gifts)
Podcasts: Pick an educational podcast to listen to together over the holidays
Plan a Family Outing: Have them research, budget, and schedule a local trip
Become the Chef: Planning and executing one full meal for the family involves reading comprehension, time management, and measurement.
Thank you notes: Write "Real" thank-you notes for presents from Friends/Family as a practical exercise in gratitude, composition and etiquette.
Watch a Documentary: Discussing a show like Planet Earth is an engaging way to practice media literacy and learn biology concepts.
Hold a "Formal" Family Debate: Choosing a fun topic and arguing both sides (e.g., "Is a hot dog a sandwich?") teaches how to construct an argument.
Explore Your Local Library: Many local libraries will run school holiday programs (reading, programing, crafts, lego, and more).

Whatever your holiday break looks like, we pray that it is filled with many happy memories. May this Christmas season be a time of deep joy for your family as you celebrate the hope and love that came into the world through Jesus Christ. We look forward to seeing our students refreshed and ready for a new year of purposeful learning in 2026.

From Miss Croft, Mr Wright & Mrs Towle