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Christmas Light STEM Project- Light Up a Tree!

If your kids are budding engineers, they will love these engineering activities for kids that is a fun Christmas light STEM project!

Technology and engineering in one and tons of Christmas STEM challenge magic.

Because of its difficulty, we recommend doing this Christmas light circuit project with middle schoolers and teens.

Looking for a fun Christmas light STEM project? Middle schoolers and teens will have a blast with the Christmas Light Circuit Project.

STEM Christmas Light Circuit Project for Kids!

If your kids are budding engineers, they will love these engineering project ideas to light up a Christmas tree! Technology and engineering in one!

My kids love building things and making things.

A few months ago, we were sent a kit from Creation Crate where you were able to program and build a mood lamp using real breadboards, circuits, and wires.

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The project itself is a bit challenging (probably best for teens), but my middle schooler was able to get it to work with a little help from me and it was a fascinating STEM activity.

coding christmas lights

We’ve had the lights sitting around ever since and I thought it would also be fun to use the lights for a Christmas project.

This activity is one of our favorite technology activities for kids!

Related: STEM Activities for Kids

How to Do the Christmas Light Circuit Project

stem projects with led lights

This light-up Christmas tree project is fun for older kids and if you are doing it with younger kids, skip the breadboard and just use a string of Christmas lights like we used to supplement our programmed lights.

What you’ll need for the Christmas Light STEM Project:

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If your kids are budding engineers, they will love these engineering project ideas to light up a Christmas tree! Technology and engineering in one!

Breadboards on Amazon

christmas tree project for kids

You can use any of these light kits for breadboard projects for kids.

LED Breadboard Kit

Expanded LED Light Breadboard Kit

Programmable Holiday Lights

Christmas Light STEM Project Directions

christmas light stem project

First, cut out your felt Christmas tree.

We drew three small triangles onto a piece of felt folded in half and cut them out (similar to how we designed our Christmas tree for our dot-marker Christmas tree).

Next, cut little holes in the tree where you want the lights to poke through.

Set up your breadboard according to the Creation Crate directions.

We had a bit of trouble with the programming, but we eventually got it to work. The programming is definitely the trickiest part.

If your kids are budding engineers, they will love these engineering project ideas to light up a Christmas tree! Technology and engineering in one!

If you are doing this with younger kids, skip this part.

Push each individual light through the holes in the felt tree from the back.

You’ll want to hide your wires as much as possible.

Obviously, your breadboard and the battery pack for the light strand will stick out, but this is an engineering project, not an art project.

When my eldest saw how complicated the coding was for our mood lamp, she appreciated the settings on our string of lights a whole lot more.

We were both impressed at how much programming goes into making a string of lights blink and dim.

If your kids are budding engineers, they will love these engineering project ideas to light up a Christmas tree! Technology and engineering in one!

Our mood lamp lights were programmed to get brighter the darker the room got, but the string of lights was not programmed to dim with natural light.

Instead, they had three switches allowing them to shine steadily, blink, or dim and brighten intermittently.

christmas stem challenge cards

Christmas STEM Activities by Grade

Christmas STEM Activities for Preschool

Christmas STEM Activities for Kindergarten

Christmas STEM Activities for 1st Grade

Christmas STEM Activities for 2nd Grade

Christmas STEM Activities for 3rd Grade

Christmas STEM Activities for 4th Grade

Christmas STEM Activities for 5th Grade

Christmas STEM Activities for Middle School

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