Kids Christmas Activity Sheet: Coloring, Word Scramble, Tic Tac Toe and More

This kids’ Christmas activity sheet fits on one page and has five activities: a holiday scene to color, a Christmas word scramble, a tic tac toe grid, blank ornaments to decorate and a word-building challenge. Tic tac toe and the ornaments suit the youngest kids. The scramble and the word building give older kids something harder. That way one sheet works for brothers and sisters of different ages at the same table.

The sheet works as a placemat while cookies bake, as a quiet activity at a holiday party or as a rainy-afternoon break from screens. Below is how to lay out each section and make your own copy, whether you draw it by hand or put it together in any design app.

What goes on a Christmas activity sheet?

Split a standard 8.5 x 11 inch page into blocks. Across the top, add a title such as “Merry Christmas Activities” in red or green letters. Under the title, leave the biggest block for coloring: a simple outline drawing of a Christmas tree with presents, a snowman or a stocking on a mantel, with thick lines and big open spaces that small hands can fill in.

• Word scramble: five or six Christmas words with their letters mixed up, such as “ENSOWNAM” for snowman or “LEBL” for bell, each with a blank line beside it.
• Tic tac toe: two or three empty grids so a pair of kids can play more than one round.
• Ornament decorating: three or four empty ball ornament outlines, each with a little cap and hook, for kids to fill with stripes, dots or zigzags.
• Word creation: a holiday phrase such as “CHRISTMAS TREE” in big letters, with lines underneath for every smaller word kids can spell using only those letters.

How do you make your own sheet?

1. Sketch the layout on scrap paper first: coloring scene at the top, then the four smaller activity boxes in a two-by-two grid below.
2. Choose your scramble words and write the answers on a separate card, so a grown-up can check them.
3. Draw the final version on white paper with a black fine-tip marker, or build it in a design app using simple shapes and an easy-to-read font.
4. Stick to black lines on white so the sheet copies or prints cleanly and every part is left for kids to color.
5. Make one copy per child, plus a few spares for guests.

If you want something sturdier, print on light cardstock so crayons and markers don’t bleed through and the sheet holds up as a placemat.

Which ages is it best for?

Preschoolers can color the scene, decorate the ornaments and play tic tac toe with a grown-up or an older sibling. Early readers can try the scramble if you add a word bank of the answers at the bottom of that box. Older kids can do the word-creation box with no help and turn it into a contest to see who finds the most words. For a mixed-age group, have the older kids finish the scramble first and then take on the younger ones at tic tac toe.

How can you use it over the holidays?

Lay one sheet at each child’s place at Christmas dinner with a small cup of crayons, so they have something to do while the adults finish eating. Slip folded copies into a travel bag for long drives to see family. At a classroom or church party, set a stack of sheets and colored pencils on a craft table. Change the scramble words and the coloring scene each December, and the same layout makes a new sheet every year. If you also made a Thanksgiving placemat, keep the same block layout so kids already know how it works.