The GIngerbread Man - EYFS/Early Years activities, Displays and ideas

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Core ‘The Gingerbread Man’ Resources

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‘Gingerbread Man’ resources in ‘Christmas’

🍪‘The Gingerbread Man’ related Theme & Activity Ideas by age (🥚0-3/🐣3-5/🐤5-7 years)

(Note: Ideas by age and stage below are merely a guideline. Please use your own discretion and knowledge of your children to ensure appropriateness of each activity and safety concerning any materials given.)

Possible Theme/Topic Titles

🥚Ages 0–3 Years (simple, sensory-rich titles to introduce the story and characters)

- Run, Run! - Catch the Biscuit! - Gingerbread Fun - Yummy Story Time - Biscuit Chase

🐣Ages 3–5 Years (support storytelling, role play, and early literacy)

- Storybook Baking - Who Will Catch Me? - Runaway Biscuit! - Follow the Gingerbread Trail

🐤Ages 5–7 Years (imaginative and inquiry-based titles to encourage deeper exploration)

- The Great Gingerbread Escape - Runaway Tales - Baking and Breaking the Rules - Tales with a Twist - Catch Me If You Can!

📚 Literacy & Storytelling

• Listen to a read-aloud version with sound buttons or puppets (🥚0–3 years)

• Sequence simple picture cards showing the story events (🐣3–5 years)

• Create a diary entry from the Gingerbread Man’s perspective (🐤5–7 years)

👃 Sensory & Baking

• Smell jars with ginger, cinnamon, and nutmeg (🥚0–3 years)

• Bake and decorate simple gingerbread men with help (🐣3–5 years)

• Set up a pretend bakery with scales, utensils, and recipes to follow (🐤5–7 years)

🎨 Creative Arts

• Make gingerbread man shapes from playdough or scented dough (🥚0–3 years)

• Decorate large paper gingerbread people with collage materials (🐣3–5 years)

• Design and illustrate a new character (e.g. “Gingerbread Cat” or “Jam Biscuit Girl”) (🐤5–7 years)

🔢 Maths

• Sort gingerbread men by size or icing colour (🥚0–3 years)

• Count buttons, match numbers, and complete gingerbread-themed patterns (🐣3–5 years)

• Create a bakery shop role play area with money and prices (🐤5–7 years)

🎭 Imaginative Play

• Explore a farm or forest small-world scene with toy characters (🥚0–3 years)

• Act out the story with costumes or masks (🐣3–5 years)

• Use story maps and props to retell or adapt the narrative in groups or create your own version of the story set in space, the jungle, etc.(🐤5–7 years)

🏃 Physical Development

• Walk, run or crawl over footprints and shapes on the floor like a chase game (🥚0–3 years)

• Hop, skip, and gallop like the animals from the story (🐣3–5 years)

• Create a Gingerbread Man dance or movement sequence with music (🐤5–7 years)

💡 Thinking & Problem-Solving

• Explore which materials the gingerbread man could float on to cross water – water play (🥚0–3 years)

• Predict what would happen if he met new animals – what would they say/do? (🐣3–5 years)

• Design a trap or escape plan for the gingerbread man – then test it! Or design a bridge to help the Gingerbread Man cross the river – test it with a biscuit! (🐤5–7 years)

Farming

Mud Kitchen

More Traditional Fairy Tales

GENERAL ‘TRADITIONAL TALES’ RESOURCES

Role-Play Packs

Related ‘Nursery Rhymes’

FURTHER PAGES TO SUPPORT LEARNING SURROUNDING ‘The ‘Gingerbread Man’

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