First Week of Advent- Advent Wreaths

Today we celebrated the first week of Advent with our K-1 class. We used our circle time to discuss what Advent means, a time of waiting in the church for Jesus's birthday. We discussed the changes in the church- the colors (purple) the evergreens and the Advent Wreath.

We explained the symbolism of the different parts of the wreath-- why there are pink and purple candles, why the wreath is round, why evergreens are used, etc. A great reference on Advent Wreaths and their history and can be found at: http://www.catholiceducation.org/articles/religion/re0132.html . This background was helpful in reviewing the parts of the wreaths we were going to make with our kids.

Additionally, we shared the information from http://catholicism.about.com/od/adventactivities/p/Advent_Wreath.htm with our parents, as it provides more instructions on what to do with the wreaths as a family at home.

For our craft, we purchased the Advent Wreath Making kits available on Oriental Trading Company. Real greenery would have been better, but I live on a treeless lot, so this wasn't really an option. The foam wreaths can be found at: http://www.orientaltrading.com/ui/browse/processRequest.do?demandPrefix=12&sku=48/712&mode=Searching&erec=9&D=advent&Ntt=advent&Ntk=all&Dx=mode%2bmatchallpartial&Ntx=mode%2bmatchallpartial&N=0&requestURI=processProductsCatalog&sd=Advent+Table+Wreath+Craft+Kit

You can get 12 kits for less than nine dollars, and they are pretty nice, with wooden candles.

This wreath kit was actually pretty doable for our age group (youngest is 4, oldest is 7). It is primarily a gluing project, elmer's glue or a similar type of fluid glue will work best. Our one tip from going through this project-- the wreath forms that come with the project are floppy and thin to start with, and when combined with glue, made it impossible to carry home. We made due by ripping up some cardboard boxes in the room and sending them home on the pieces of carboard, but in the future, we will plan ahead with precut cardboard, perhaps covered with a purple piece of paper, so that it looks nicer and we don't need to worry about floppy wreaths and glue overuse...

We sent the kids home with handouts based on some of the information we had researched above. All in all, a positive class.