With the prevalence of email and social networking websites, writing letters is becoming an obsolete art! Help your child revive this pastime by teaching him how to compose a friendly letter. He'll draft a letter to Santa Claus, complete with date, salutation, body, closing, and signature, all the components of a paper letter.
What You Need:
- Lined paper
- Pencil or pen
What You Do:
- Explain to your child that there are different types of letters that people can write to one another. There are friendly or personal letters, business letters, cover letters, memos, thank you notes, etc. Each type of letter has a different format and rules to follow. Today she will writing a "friendly" or "personal" letter to Santa Claus.
- Have your child start with a lined piece of paper and pencil. She should begin the heading in the upper right hand corner. Ask your child write her return address and the date underneath. You may skip a line between the address and the date.
- Instruct your child to skip a couple of lines and have her write the salutation or greeting starting on the left hand side, followed by a comma. For example, "Dear Mr. Santa Claus," or "Dear St. Nick,". She should not indent the salutation.
- Then skip another line and indent to begin the body of the letter. Have your child compose a paragraph to Santa Claus. She may wish to begin with, "I'm writing to you because..." Your child may wish to tell him what she wants for Christmas or just to ask how he is doing.
- After your child has finished the body paragraph, have her indent again and add a conclusion. For example, "I can't wait for you to come on Christmas Eve! I'll leave milk and cookies out for you."
- Finally, have your child write the closing. Skip a line and line up the closing with the heading above on the right hand side followed by a comma. For example, "Your Friend," "Love," or "Sincerely," etc.
- Ask your child to write her signature or print her name underneath the closing.
Your child can mail it to the North Pole (really!). Simply address the letter to: Santa Claus, North Pole, Alaska. Most metropolitan areas have a post office that participates in a program that utilizes volunteers and charitable organizations to respond to kids' letters to Santa. To learn more about the program, visit the USPS Letters to Santa Program website.
If your local post office does not participate, or if you want to creatively handle the response yourself, simply "drop it off" at the post office after taking your kids to school. You can have a letter waiting for your kids in the mailbox just a few days later!
Add your own comment