Christmas Fair Games

Science based games can be a great fun and educational addition to a school Christmas fair. Last weekend, we added a Christmas twist to some old favourites for a stall at our local school, which the children loved!

Christmas Lava Lamp

The downside of a lava lamp is the cost of Alka Seltzer, and because it contains asprin, it must be closely supervised at all times, but they are easy to set up, reusable and great fun to watch.

If they are used frequently, they do take a while to calm down, so you might need a spare one on standby!

Christmas lava lamps - game ideas fort a school Christmas Fair

Optical Illusion

You can change these slightly depending on the stall's style. My festive optical illusion template makes the activity very simple, but children can also draw their own pictures. One side just needs to complement the other.

If you wanted to use these on a craft stall, you could leave one side blank so the children could design Christmas tree decorations or the snowman's face themselves.

Candy Cane Goo

This is another inexpensive and easy activity. All you need is cornflour, water, peppermint essence, and red food colouring to make a lovely, Christmassy-smelling gloop.

I asked the children to use chunky tweezers, which I bought from Learning Resources to pick three marbles from the goo ( which was harder than it looked as it was sticky and slippy at the same time ) and drop them into the muffin sorting tins. This activity was very popular and great for improving fine motor control skills.

Help the elves find their jingle bells

This activity uses small bells and shaving foam. The idea is that the children use tweezers to rescue the jingle bells.

Make a fizzy elf lab

We also had great fun at our last fair with this fizzy elf lab. Children add vinegar to a test tube containing food colouring, washing-up liquid, water, and baking soda. The vinegar reacts with the baking soda to create a foamy reaction.