We have everything you need to make the Christmas holidays amazing for your kids with the best Christmas science activities! Kids will love exploring Christmas science this year with ideas that are easy to do at home or school. Add a science experiment or two to your Christmas activities!
Christmas Science Experiments
Our Christmas science activities are fun, easy to set up, and not time-consuming. You can pick up all the materials you need during your Christmas shopping! These fantastic choices for Christmas science experiments can even be turned into a fun countdown to Christmas. You will find more about this below.
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You can set up simple Christmas activities perfect for preschoolers through elementary grades. With hands-on activities, you can introduce basic science concepts through conversation and asking simple questions.
Check out more awesome Christmas sensory bin ideas and play activities for toddlers and preschoolers!
TRY Christmas 5 Senses Activity ⭐️
This can be as easy to set up as grabbing a tray or plate and finding some Christmas-themed materials to add to it. Good choices include jingle bells, cinnamon sticks, Christmas cookies or candy, glittery bows, and evergreen branches—anything to explore sight, sound, smell, taste, and touch.
Download and print the sheet below. Kids can write about their experiences with each item or what goes with each category. Depending on the age group, the activity can be organized in a few ways.
New! Reindeer Toothpaste
Reindeer toothpaste is a fun and festive chemical reaction experiment demonstrating hydrogen peroxide’s rapid decomposition, creating a foamy eruption perfect for holiday-themed science!
New! Christmas Bioplastics Ornaments
Create festive bioplastic ornaments by mixing renewable materials like cornstarch and vinegar, exploring the science of polymer formation and eco-friendly alternatives to traditional plastics.
Fizzing Christmas Trees
Christmas science with fizzing Christmas trees. We put a bit of spin on the classic baking soda and vinegar science activity! Watch the video and check out the directions.
Crystal Candy Canes
Turn chemistry into a Christmas tree ornament when you learn about solutions, mixtures, and growing crystals. These look beautiful hanging on the tree and are sturdy. We have kept ours for several years now!
Dissolving Candy Canes
This is an easy Christmas science experiment to set up with the kids and offers room for exploration as you test different liquids or different temperatures of water. What about even testing different colored candy canes?
Candy Cane Fluffy Slime
Although we have a whole collection of Christmas slime recipes to choose from, I have highlighted a few in this Christmas science list as well. Slime is science and does fit into the NGSS science standards especially for states of matter.
More Christmas Slime Recipes
We make Christmas slime in so many fun ways that it may be hard to choose which one to try first! From fluffy to glittery and gingerbread scented to Santa themed….
Christmas Skittles Experiment
This easy Christmas science lab is a colorful example of water stratification, and kids will love the fascinating candy science! This candy science experiment uses a classic candy, Skittles in fun Christmas colors.
Crystal Gingerbread Man Ornaments
These are very similar to our crystal candy canes above and perfect if you have a favorite gingerbread man theme book you want to pair with a science activity too.
Fizzing Gingerbread Man Experiment
Baking is all about chemistry and is perfect for Christmas science. Although we aren’t baking cookies here, we are testing out an alternative to baking soda and vinegar reactions. Ever wonder how cookies get their lift?
Gingerbread Man Salt Crystal Ornaments
Another fun way to grow crystals is with salt! This is perfect for the youngest scientists because all you need is salt and water. These will take longer to form then the borax crystal ideas above, but it’s a terrific process just the same.
Scented Christmas Slime
Another favorite slime recipe for the holiday season because of it’s incredible smell! Of course you can mix it up with pumpkin pie spice or just plain cinnamon.
Dissolving Gingerbread Man Cookies
Another fun Christmas science activity, dissolving gingerbread man cookies to pair with a favorite Christmas book!
Christmas Catapult
Building a simple catapult is a great way to explore physics through play! Newton’s laws of motion pair nicely with this homemade STEM activity for Christmas.
Melting Santa’s Frozen Hands
The kids are always amazed by this one, and it’s really easy to set up! Help melt Santa’s frozen hands with simple science.
Magnetic Ornaments
Explore the power of magnetism with Christmas ornaments and magnetic and non-magnetic objects. Have the kids guess yes or no, and test their answers!
Jumping Tinsel
Explore static electricity with a balloon and tinsel for an easy Christmas theme science experiment.
Erupting Volcano Christmas Ornaments
One of the must fun Christmas science activities to date! Watching these ornaments erupt is always a blast. This is classic baking soda and vinegar with a Christmas twist.
Christmas Science with Mini Eruptions
It’s another easy version of a classic science activity. Set up a baking soda and vinegar reaction in mini cups with plenty of Christmas glitter.
Santa’s Magic Milk
The kids love this classic science experiment because of the amazing results! We know Santa is sure to have magic milk during the holidays.
Magnetic Wreathe Ornament
It’s a science and craft activity all in one, especially if you have a reluctant crafter!
Peppermint Oobleck
Young kids love this Christmas science activity with peppermints or candy canes! A great kitchen science experiment using only 2 basic ingredients plus the peppermints and candy canes of course!
Bending Candy Canes
Science or magic? Turn your candy cane into a circle without it breaking.
Grinch Slime
Do you love the Grinch? You can help the Grinch grow his heart with our homemade slime. Plus, the confetti hearts are fun!
Hot Chocolate Science ⭐️
Explore states of matter with this fun hot cocoa and marshmallows activity.
FREE Hot Cocoa States of Matter Christmas Printable
Santa’s Balloon Rocket ⭐️
3-2-1 blast off! What happens when you use a balloon to power Santa’s sleigh? Will he make his rounds in time, or will he fall flat? Not only is this science activity awesome and fun, but it also explores physics and the laws of motion!
More Fun Christmas Science
Science Christmas Ornaments
If you want an alternative to the usual Christmas crafts, try making these cool scientific decorations for kids.
Christmas STEM Activities
With these Christmas STEM ideas, you can build a sleigh for Santa, explore math with candy, make gingerbread house tessellations, and more. We have included ideas for science, technology, engineering, and math with simple materials.
LEGO Advent Calendar
Make your own or grab our free printable LEGO Christmas calendar to use this year.
Printable Christmas STEM Project Pack
200+ PAGES OF HOLIDAY THEME STEAM, STEM, Science, and Art!
- 25+ Christmas theme science and STEM activities with printable sheets, instructions, and useful information all using easy-to-source materials perfect for limited-time needs. Includes a holiday theme engineering pack with fun, problem-based challenges for kids to solve! NEW observation sheets included.
- Try a Santa’s Letter airplane challenge or take the gingerbread house-building challenge!
- Explore the five senses with a specially designed Santa’s Lab pack.
- Try a mini nature study with your favorite type of Christmas tree.
- Try your hand at building shapes with gumdrop structure challenge cards or build shapes with jingle bells. Or try the Christmas-themed paper chain challenge!
- Christmas Screen-free Coding activities include algorithm games, binary code ornaments, and more!
- Explore 6+ Christmas Art Projects with famous artist-inspired activities that combine art history, process art techniques, and more with simple to-do ideas.
Christmas tree slime…just the name alone makes me want to try this one!
These ideas are so much fun! Now to decide which one to try first! 🙂
Awesome!
Can you use anything in place of the Borax? I work in a elementary autism room and some of our students are very oral. They put their hands in their mouths quite often. I would love to make the crystal ornaments with them.
Check out our salt crystal activities instead. You could make paper candy cane cutouts. These will at least be taste-safe.
https://littlebinsforlittlehands.com/growing-salt-crystal-hearts-valentines-day/