This purposeful Christmas-themed writing activity has been designed to accompany a whole class reading of the picture book Santa Post by Emma Yarlett. These writing templates will inspire your students to compose a letter to Santa that gets singed in his fireplace!

After reading the text, students will compose a letter to Santa. Once complete, they must cover the name of the gift with ‘burn marks’, just like Amy’s letter in the story! Students can draw or write the name of the gift in the box on the front page of their letter and cover it with a cut and paste gift, creating a lift-the-flap effect. Challenge your students to share their letters with their classmates and see if they can guess what gift they are hoping Santa will being them.

To suit the needs of your class, we have included templates with 18mm and 24mm lines. To create the burn mark effect over the ‘important information’, students can:

1. Cut out pieces of brown paper to glue on top of the gift’s name.
2. Carefully cut the important information out.
3. Add smudges over the important information with a brown or black marker, crayon or paint.

This task is perfect for independent work, a small group task, scribing, evidence for assessment or for a relief folder!

Younger students may benefit from having this resource enlarged to A3 to provide more space for drawing and writing.

Available in our basic fun font and all Australian state fonts.

Check out more amazing resources related to Santa Post in our Santa Post PACKAGE.