By Diane Brauner on November 15, 2021
Educators are always searching for ways to make lessons fresh and exciting. Embedding seasonal activities provides creative learning opportunities while integrating required curriculum. Students love engaging holiday- and season-related themes!
Here is a list of season-themed lessons and activities blog posts on Paths to Technology; these posts are organized by months and/or seasons. Make this post a "Favorite" so that you can refer back to it!
Help expand this summary page with your favorite seasonal activities. We are missing many important national holidays as well as seasonal activities. We are actively recruiting posts on holidays celebrated in various countries and cultures! Stay tuned, as future seasonal posts will be added!
Seasonal-Themed Summary Posts
August
Beginning of Year
- Back to School Activity: Accessible Find My Friend
- Back to School Activity: How I Like to Learn
- Back to School Activity: How I Like to Learn
- BookShare Back to School Series #1
- Dear Elementary School Teacher: Back to School Part 1
- Dear Middle School Teacher: Back to School Part 2
- Dear High School Teacher: Back to School Part 3
- First Day of Preschool: ePub Book
- Going Nuts about a new School Year
- QR Kids: Back to School/Open House Activity
Beginning of Year Resources for Gen Ed Teachers
- Back-to-school Information for TVIs to share with General Education Teachers
- Creating Accessible PowerPoints: Teacher Resource
- Creating Accessible Word Docs & PowerPoints: Teacher Resource
- Creating Engaging Adapted CVI-Friendly Books with Nothing but Free Apps and an iPad
- How to Create Accessible Digital Maps Using SAS Graphics Accelerator and Google Maps
- Inaccessible vs. Accessible PDFs: Making All PDFs Accessible!
September
National Play-Doh Day: September 16
Fall Themes
October
White Cane Day: October 15
- Cane Songs
- My Cane: A Preschooler's Book
- Walk Your Own Path: Sidewalk Mural
- White Cane Day! (Poem; large print and tactile graphic of cane)
- White Cane Day 2020: Pete the Cat Video
- White Cane Day Boom Cards
- White Cane Day Video: Can’t Stop Believing
Halloween/Fall Festival
- Contraction Magic: A Bewitching Way of Teaching Braille Contractions
- Creating Tactile Graphics Images Part 8: Multiple Pumpkin Worksheets
- Halloween Suduko Puzzle
- Halloween Suduko Part 2: Tactile Graphics
- Incorporating Blindness Canes into Halloween Costumes
- Labeling Images: Parts of a Bat Lesson
- Monster: Note Taking Skills
- Monster: Note Taking Skills Part 2
- Multiple Pumpkin-Themed Worksheets
- Noelle’s Pumpkin: Fall themed Digital Book for Early readers
- Pumpkin Life Cycle Lesson: Presentations (PowerPoint)
- Pumpkin Writing Prompts Lesson: Digital Creative Writing
- Spider Activities
- Turkey vs. Eagle: Debate Writing and Note Taking
- Trick-or-Treat Orientation Activity
November
Veteran’s Day
Thanksgiving
- Digital Thanksgiving Book for Early Readers
- Gus the Ghost and Thanksgiving Poem: Reading Comprehension Activities
- Noelle's Pumpkin: Fall Themed Book for Early Readers
- Screen Reader Tech Activities: Thanksgiving Lesson Plan
- Talking Turkey: Using the Butterball for iOS App
- Turkey Activities: Front and Side View Tactile Graphics
December
- BrailleCode Cookies
- Blindfold Greeting App (Create customized digital greeting cards)
- Christmas Alphabet Book
- Christmas Themed Book for Early Readers: Noelle’s Christmas Tree
- Elf Activities: Bringing People together!
- Elf Activities: Image Descriptions
- Elf On a Shelf
- The gift of independence: O&M Success story and activity (O&M: Christmas shopping)
- The Grinch and Max: Emerging Reader Digital Book (contrations: Not, Like and But)
- Holiday Gifts for Students with Visual Impairments
- Noelle's Christmas Themed Book for Early Readers: Noelle's Christmas Tree
- Peak-a-boo Presents App Review (1 finger gestures)
- Reindeer Activities
- Santa’s Sleigh Ride: Geography and Map Activities
- Student Christmas Gifts
Hour of Code (coding related posts - too many posts to list separately. See the Coding Posts Summary for links to all the coding posts!)
January
New Year’s (Resolutions)
- 2020: The Year In Which Education Changed
- New Year’s Tech Resolutions
- TVI and O&M Professional New Year’s Resolutions
World Braille Day (January 4, 2021)
- Braille Boom Cards: Braille Learning Series 2 (Includes a Boom Deck for Braille World Day)
- Braille Code Cookies
- Ten Facts About World Braille Day
Winter
- Coding Concepts: #3: A Snowy Day
- Navigating Google Sheets with JAWS Lesson: Artic Animals
- Snow Globe Shake-Up: Tech Skills (cut and paste) (Language arts activity including sequencing plot, commands to navigate, copy/cut and paste)
- Snowman Activities (Hands-on, Comprehension and Tech)
- Snowman Stories: QR Codes
- Using Celebrations to Teach JAWS
- Using Snowman QR Codes: O&M Lesson
- Winter Puns: Comprehension Activity
February
Valentine’s Day: Feb 14
- Eight ways to read handwritten cards with AT
- Tactile Stickers for Valentine's Day Cards Activity
- Valentine’s Day Tech Activities
- Valentines’ Day Puns iBook
March
St. Patrick’s Day (March 17)
National Chip and Dip Day: March 23
April
Easter
- Easter Egg Hunt: O&M orientation Lesson
- Easter Egg Hunt for students with Visual Impairments
- Easter Writing/Tech Activities for students who use screen readers
- Egg Carton Unplugged Coding Activity
- Eggs-citing Tactile Graphic Activities!
- Egg Idioms: Tech Activities
- Why the Easter Bunny Brings Easter Eggs: Folktale
Spring
- Clouds: iBook and Activity
- Ladybugs: ePub Book (includes info to consider when creating a book)
- O&M Activity: The Interstate's Forgotten Code (Travel: spring break vacation, Christmas trip, summer vacation)
May
Global Accessibility Awareness Day (Third Thursday of May)
- How to Celebrate Global Accessibility Awareness Day Every Day
- May Flowers: Presentation and Potpourri Activities
Mother's Day
Memorial Day
Transition
- My Technology Book (transition book that includes information about the student's specific technology & visual needs)
- Rylie's Transition to Middle School Video
- Samantha: Self-Advocating Transition to Middle School
- Student's Outline for eMail to New 8th Grade Teachers
College Transition
- Eight Things I am glad my TVI taught me about Transition
- Online Activities that Help Prepare for College Transition
- Ten Things I Wish My TVI taught me about transition
- What I wish I Had Learned Before Starting College: Video
- What I Wish I Had Learned About Assistive Technology Before Starting College: Part 1
June
Summer vacation
- A Day at the Beach: iBook and Tactile Book
- O&M Activity: The Interstate's Forgotten Code (Travel: spring break vacation, Christmas trip, summer vacation)
- The Beach iBook
- How Do People with visual Impairments . . . Attend Summer Camps?
July
Resources
Paths to Technology Summary Posts are 'hot topic' posts that link to additional posts on the same topic, making it easier to follow a specific topic. These Summary posts are "living" posts, meaning that as new posts are published on that topic, a link to the new post will be added to the Summary Post.
Current Summary Posts include:
- Coding Posts Summary
- Math Apps and Activities Summary Post for Students K-3rd Grade
- SAS Graphics Accelerator Summary Post (Accessible, non-visual digital charts, graphics, and maps)
- Sonification Summary Page
