If your preschool has a high level of parental involvement, you may have your preschoolers create family trees. While these don’t have to be long and detailed, they can trace the immediate family and the grandparents. It can also be made creative, actually drawing a tree with branches that reach to each family member.
You can also have your students create Grandparents Day “gift bags”. Make the bag as much a part of the gift as what it contains by having your students color paper lunch bags. Then, fill it with a hand-crafted greeting card for the holiday and perhaps things like a colored picture or a couple of pieces of candy.
One fun idea, if you have the time and patience, is to have the children put on a show. They could act out a scene depicting children showing respect and thanks to the elderly or even sing to their grandparents. Having these respected members of society visit the classroom could be a very special event and could make the elderly feel useful. At the same time, perhaps the children’s grandparents could visit and tell stories from their youth, read books, or even just answer questions about the “olden days”.
With signed permission slips, you may plan a field trip to a nursing home, where the children can greet the lonely elderly and wish them a happy Grandparents Day at a time when there is no one else to bring such a pleasant message to their lives.
Or, you could simply plan an arts and crafts activity that will create a cute gift for the childrens' grandparents on this special holiday.