Gingerbread Houses

Building gingerbread houses with the students is a seasonal activity that also develops oral language, reading and writing, and integrates Common Core Standards of science and technology.  Before we built the houses, we read some books about gingerbread houses (Jan Brett's The Gingerbread Baby) and a few different versions of the Gingerbread Boy.



We have also been writing and reading directions about building a gingerbread house.  For older students, they read a passage from ReadWorks.com and answered questions.  With the younger students, we wrote out on chart paper directions for putting together a gingerbread house.  Later children wrote about constructing their gingerbread houses in an informational piece and wrote a fiction

Materials for house construction:

Non-edible:  paper plates, muffin tin liners (for holding various decorating candies), small cups (Dixie cups work well for icing), popsicle sticks or knives for spreading icing, a bowl for mixing, hand mixer, if you are feeling adventurous- sandwich bags to use to "pipe" the icing


Optional:  a disposable table cloth, paper towels, small (rinsed and emptied) milk or juice cartons to build around

Food items:  egg whites (Egg Beaters are a good bet, they are pasteurized and no need to separate eggs), confectioner's sugar, cream of tartar, and graham crackers.  For decorating- the lighter the candy, the more likely it is to stick- sprinkles, Nerds, M & Ms, chocolate chips, more traditionally- gum drops and candy canes, but they are both heavy!

There are a variety of recipes for Royal icing, the white icing that hardens when it dries, here is one that I used:

• 3 cups confectioners' sugar  
•  2 egg whites, beaten
• 1/4 teaspoon cream of tartar 

        Royal icing can be colored with food coloring
        - makes 4 cups
 (*if kids eat the icing, the eggs should be pasteurized)

Process: 
1.) Set up and out all of the materials 
     Each child receives:  a paper plate, a milk carton, a small cup for icing, a popsicle stick or   disposable knife, 6 graham cracker pieces
 
2.) Make the royal icing according to recipe

3.)  Children build the houses around the milk carton

4.)  After 5-10 minutes of drying time (they can read or color after washing their hands) start decorating
 

This was mad with gluten-free graham crackers, so proportions are different.

This is a super messy (but fun) activity-  be prepared!