Aistear: The Post Office

One of my favourite themes to do around Christmas time is the Post Office. I introduce the topic with the story The Jolly Christmas Postman and we set up a post office in the classroom. It also serves as a post office for the children in the class who want to give Christmas Cards, all cards are posted in our post office and delivered on the day of the holidays.

In setting up the areas I created signs and labels for the socio-dramatic area that were representative of the Irish Post Office. Now, twinkl.co.uk have a display set especially for the Irish Post Office. Click here to visit their page. I changed my sand area to a writing area, in the writing area I had a variety of pens, pencils, paper, envelopes, notepaper and cards that the children could create and have for the socio-dramatic area the following day. This worked really well, and gave the classroom a break from the sand.

I also arrange a visit from our local postman towards the end of the topic, he enjoys coming into the class and talking to the children about his job. One year he brought a special delivery from the North Pole and told the class all about his trip to Santa to deliver the letters. it was magic!

Last year, I made a story sack of the Jolly Postman, and in the pack I included cards, and paper for writing thank you letters, the children could write them at home with their parents and post them in the class. It helped to link with the parents and encourage them to discuss the Post Office at home. I also designed a newsletter for parents on the theme which is available in my Mash.ie store.

The Post Office could be covered at any stage of the year, but I do like to cover this theme around Christmas.

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