Looking for a new, clean, fun, uplifting, encouraging, bright, colorful, musical Christmas movie this year?!
Jingle Jangle on Netflix is all of this and more! It’s sure to become an instant favorite in your house this Christmas! (I am not affiliated with this movie or Netflix, I just love it so much I have to tell everyone! 🙂 )
I enjoyed it so much I immediately felt inspired to create a Quest to go along with it! You’ll need lots of creativity and jingle bells for this one! 😉
Warning: If you haven’t seen the movie yet, spoilers may be below…
For this Quest you will need:
- All printable worksheets (see below)
- Plain paper
- Colored pencils
- Pencils
- Construction paper
- Tape or stapler
- Glue and/or hot glue
- Ribbons, gears, feathers, beads, bangles, and the like
- Jingle bells, green and red (if you don’t have these to hand, use the mini marshmallows or small cotton balls you’ll be using for the catapult)
- Christmas cups (paper or plastic)
- Curved glass (like a wine glass)
- Light ball (like a ping-pong ball)
- Large popsicle sticks (need 15 per catapult)
- Rubberbands (need 9 per catapult)
- Plastic spoon (need 1 per catapult)
- Mini marshmallows or small cotton balls
- Lemon juice
- Cotton swabs (Q-tips)
- Light bulb or candle
- Craft supplies like toilet paper tubes, brads, beads, felt, paper, etc.
Pre-Quest Prep:
The home-educator should read through the Quest in advance, to be sure he or she has everything necessary and to-hand. Print off all necessary worksheets, one per student.
In this Quest, kids will learn: musical exercise, problem-solving, clothing history, math, physics, addition, scientific observation, centrifugal force, cooperation, invention, chemical reactions, reading, writing, physical movement, and creative construction.
To Begin:
Let’s open with a song! Turn on Jingle Jangle and dance to the song “This Day” to get your blood pumping and your heart thumping! If you’d like to find just the song quickly, watch this YouTube video.
Before going any further…
It’s time for the kids to sign Jeronicus’s contract. Save and print the contract below.
Prepare lemon juice in a small bowl with some cotton swabs. (If possible, don’t let the kids see what they’re signing with!) Have the kids dip the cotton swabs in the lemon juice and then sign their names at the bottom of the contract in the white box.
They shouldn’t be able to see their signature, other than it being wetter on the paper.
Set aside to dry.
Now you may begin the Quest…
Hat Design
You’re gonna need a hat for this Quest! Using ribbons, gears, feathers, beads, bangles, and the like, decorate construction paper to wear as a hat/hair accessory! (If you don’t have time for this step, you can skip ahead, or limit their creative time to 5-10 min. to ensure you’ll have time for the rest of the Quest.)
Begin by cutting two strips of construction paper and taping or stapling them together so they sit snuggly around the child’s head. Then, on another piece of paper trace around the edges, giving a slight lip on one side. Tape the circle to the brim and voila!
Another option is to use a headband and a hot glue gun (I recommend parents do the actual gluing!).
Let the kids decorate the hats however they’d like. Encourage them to think outside the box and be inspired by the costumes in Jingle Jangle!
Colorful Costuming
My favorite part of this movie was the costuming, so let’s get colorfully creative! Using the outfit forms below, design your own costumes using as many vibrant colors as you can!
You could challenge your kids to make a different pattern of colors on each costume. Work on patterns of ABAB, ABCABC, AABB, etc.
While the kids are creating, show them examples of historical Victorian and Edwardian clothing styles, so they can see the difference the vibrant colors make in the designs. Check out Pinterest for a variety of inspiration.
You could also check out Recollections, which is where I buy my author costumes. Although I’m not affiliated with them, I love them and strongly recommend them. Their website and blog are fantastic places to learn more about costuming for different eras, and to find some great examples of historically accurate clothing.
Or head to linktr.ee/pmeredithauthor for all my links. 🙂
Jingle Bell Math
Magic Man G is trying to steal 30 inventions from Jeronicus Jangle! Set up two teams: Green (G-Man) and Red (Jeronicus).
Set a Christmas cup in between the two teams. We found taping the cup to the ground helped keep it from moving during the game.
Have each team grab their color of jingle bells and sit an equal distance away from the cup. When an adult calls, “Go!” have each team throw their jingle bells into the cup. Once both teams are out of bells, pause, mark how many of each color made it into the cup, gather the bells, and go again!
Have the kids keep track of the score using the worksheet provided. They can either color in the boxes in the 5×6 grid or practice tally marks, or both! The first to 30 inventions wins!
Flying Robot
The kids in Jingle Jangle quickly learn that Belief is what is required to help Buddy fly. Although I can’t help you make a flying robot, I can show you a very cool and simple science experiment to make a ball fly.
All you’ll need is a curved glass (like a wine glass) and a light ball (like a ping-pong ball). (I do recommend you test this activity before showing the kids to be sure you can do it correctly for the “wow” factor. 😉 )
Place the ball on the table. Ask the kids: How could you make the ball fly without touching it?
Now, place out the curved glass, some paper, rubber bands, and other options. Ask the kids: How could you use any of these objects to make the ball fly without touching it?
They should quickly find that gravity likes to pull things down, so although they might find ways to bring the ball up, it soon falls back to the earth.
Now, for the magic: Raise your palms, blow on them, and rub them together just like Jeronicus does before doing his magic configurations. Place the curved glass over the ball. Ask the kids to Believe. They have to Believe to make the magic work!
Slowly spin the glass over the ball. Soon the ball should begin curving along the outside of the glass and slowly lift up the edge. Continuing to circle the glass in a fluid motion, lift the glass and ball off the table. You’ve made the ball fly with the help of the kids’ Belief! (And a little science, of course.😉 )
Snowball Fight!
Time to practice some physics by making a Snowball Launcher! This particular Snowball Launcher will be an indoor one, however, so we recommend having it throw marshmallows or cotton balls instead of snowballs.😉
To build a launcher, begin by collecting large popsicle sticks, rubber bands, and a plastic spoon.
- Make an X with 2 sticks and 1 rubber band around the middle.
- Rubber band together a stack of 7 sticks with two rubber bands.
- Attach the X to the stack of sticks as shown.
- Now, attach 3 sticks with 1 rubber band, as shown. Pull the middle stick out a little bit.
- Make a second one like that and attach together as shown.
- Push into a square shape and attach 2 more rubber bands on the corners that don’t have them yet.
- Attach the large cross or “X piece” to one side of the square as shown, using 2 more rubber bands.
- Attach the spoon as shown.
- Now pull back and let ‘er go!
You could just launch “snowballs” at each other—but if you’d rather avoid inviting mayhem…
We set up bowls with different point values on them and had the kids aim their launchers at them. We then kept score of their points and had them add up their points at the end. Because we chose to label our bowls 10, 20, 30, 40, and 50, it was a good chance to practice our place values and adding these (albeit simple) double-digit numbers together.
Escape from the Factory
Help Journey and Edison find their way out of the tunnels of G-Man’s factory with this maze worksheet!
Invention Time
Jeronicus needs your help in creating a new invention to save the shop. Using a variety of supplies, create something special and unique!
Set out craft supplies like toilet paper tubes, tape, brads, glue, felt, paper, etc. and encourage your kids to get creative!
Bird made “Bunny”: a robot who bakes cookies and climbs to high places to get things down for kids. Blue made a claw and a robot to help people reach down high things. (I’m sensing a theme in what they feel they need the most help with! 😉 )
Have the kids fill out this invention sheet with a drawing of what they created, and a write-up of what it does and how it works.
Invisible Ink
Remember that piece of paper you had the kids sign at the beginning in lemon juice? Now’s the time for the big reveal!
Light a candle and carefully wave the paper over the candle where the kids can see. Watch as their signatures appear just like in Jingle Jangle!
Heating lemon juice causes the sugars in the juice to react with oxygen in the air, which turns the sugars brown! Chemistry magic!
If they’d like, and you have the time, let the kids write their own things and draw their own pictures in lemon juice on paper so they can check them later, after they’ve dried, to watch the whole process from beginning to end!
Thank you for joining us on our Jingle Jangle Quest!
If you haven’t seen Jingle Jangle yet, I hope this Quest will encourage you to do so. It really is an instant holiday classic and will be watched MANY times this season in our house!
Merry Christmas to all and happy Questing!
