AB Pattern with Christmas

This sheet teaches the AB pattern — the first repeating pattern young children learn. Two Christmas things pictures take turns along a train, and the child completes the empty wagons by continuing the alternating rule. Noticing that the sequence goes first-second-first-second and predicting what follows is foundational patterning, a Kindergarten readiness skill built on looking and reasoning, not counting.

The value of an AB pattern is its clarity: two pictures, one simple rule, endlessly extendable. A Kindergarten child practises finding the rule and carrying it forward — the heart of patterning — and the familiar Christmas things keep the focus on the rhythm rather than on figuring out the pictures.

Children who get the hang of the AB back-and-forth start predicting the next picture at a glance, and finishing a clean alternating train feels satisfying, a small and clear early win. When this feels easy, try the pattern in ab pattern with classroom objects, or ab pattern with dinosaurs. You can also browse every pattern worksheet or the whole kindergarten collection — each sheet prints cleanly or plays online for free, and the more two-part patterns a child completes, the readier they are for patterns where a picture starts to double — the natural next step up the ladder.