After Winter Break Activity Worksheets

About this resource

The first week back in January is a good time to ask, "What did you do over winter break?" These after winter break activity worksheets for grades 1 to 5 turn that question into writing. A child draws a memory and finishes "Over winter break I ...", fills six bubbles in a "What I did" web, picks one small step for getting back into the school routine, writes a full story with starters printed, and colors a box each day they work on their goal. Four layouts take a child from one picture and three lines to an eight-line draft.

EVERYTHING INSIDE (25 pages)

• 14 student pages: 12 writing prompts, 1 word page ("break", "winter", "family", "trip", "gift" and 3 more words, printed big) and 1 routine tracker
• Break Memory: 3 pages, a question, a picture box to draw in, and 3 lines with a sentence starter printed
• What I Did Web: 3 pages (fun things, places and people, feelings), a center bubble and 6 bubbles with 2 lines in each
• Back in Routine: 3 pages (mornings, in class, after school), each with My goal, Step 1, Step 2, Step 3 and Who can help me?
• Write It: 3 pages, 8 lines with four starters printed on each page (a winter break story, feeling back at school, plans for this month)
• Routine Tracker: 1 page with a goal line and 10 boxes to color, each with a line for what the child did
• 6 pages with sentence starters already printed; the web pages, the Back in Routine pages, the word page and the tracker are left for the child's own words
• 1 teacher log (one row for each of the 12 prompts), 1 class grid (15 students), 1 filled example (an invented student)
• 1 family note with three ways to help at home, 1 phrase bank of 15 observable-language starters
• 1 binder cover and 6 divider tabs with a spine label to cut out
• Start Here and terms of use

Built For The Child Holding The Page

A big "My name" line, one short instruction with a small pencil icon, the question in large rounded letters, and lines with real spacing. Nothing on a student page is written for an adult, there is no score, and no student page needs scissors or glue. Every child has a winter break to write about, so there is no wrong answer.

Type In, Or Print

The name and date lines, every ruled line, the log, class grid and family note are type-in fields in any PDF reader, so you can type a starter or a word onto a line before you print. The picture boxes and the tracker boxes are left for drawing and coloring. Every page prints clean in black and white. This is a fillable PDF; it is not a Google Slides or PowerPoint file.

Who This Is For

Teachers in grades 1 to 5, self-contained and resource rooms, writing centers, small groups, tutors and families who want a back-from-break writing activity a child can start on their own. Some children celebrate a winter holiday and some do not; the prompts ask about time off, people, places and feelings, not about any one holiday.

What This Is, And What It Is Not

Writing and reflection pages with the record-keeping around them. There is no scoring and no rubric, and it is not a timed test, a screener or a clinical tool. It makes no claim about any student's age or rate of progress, and there is no IEP goal language or eligibility wording anywhere in the file.