These sorts of motif could also be used as decoration for wire Christmas trees, made as decoration for classroom window-sills or for party tables. The trees themselves are shown in the diagram. The wire will probably need to be covered with crepe paper or metal foil or painted.

There is a large range of possible Christmas friezes and pictures and many of these ideas can be used at other times of the year for other purposes. An attractive frieze, offering the same sorts of opportunities for individual creation as the mobiles, can be made with a background of cut-out Christmas trees. The trees themselves are cut from large sheets of coloured paper of one colour and stuck on to sheets of another colour. It is, generally speaking, best to make the background to such a frieze rather limited in colour and rather dark in tone. This helps to show up the brightly coloured contributions of individual children. If you work it out carefully, it is possible to make an interchange pattern by cutting the tree from a sheet of paper and using the remainder of the sheet to form the background on another sheet (see diagram). The two variations can then be placed alternately. The children make individual motifs to decorate the trees, which are stuck or pinned on to them. Once again the cut-out stars, snowflakes and flowers are suitable and some motifs which are more or less three-dimensional arc effective. "Candles" and "Icicles" made from rolled paper or foil, look well. Small children can cut out parcels of one kind or another and strips of foil and tinsel can be cut and draped across the trees. Here again is a scheme of decoration which even the youngest children can gain from taking part in and which at the same time gives scope to the older children.

Wire Christmas tree frieze.

Background for Christmas tree.

Christmas scenes, either as friezes or pictures, or as three-dimensional projects can be built up as class or group projects, each child making an individual part of the whole. A good way of making a frieze or picture is to let each child build up a figure or animal from collage materials on strong paper. These are then cut out and placed on a background which has been prepared by other children.

Whatever Christmas ideas you may carry out in the classroom it is of real importance to encourage children to look critically at the room and to weigh the merits of one piece of decoration or colour against another. The glamour of Christmas and the temporary nature of Christmas decorations tend to make us accept combinations of materials which are not really pleasing. I do not mean that we should impose our ideas of what is suitable upon children—far from it. I mean merely that they should learn to appreciate that this is something which needs thought and consideration.

Icicle made from metalfoil.