Boxing Day Worksheet Download

Imagine you are waking up on December 26 in Canada, Britain, or Australia. The wrapping paper is piled high, but the fun is not over! In these places and several others, the day after Christmas is a holiday called Boxing Day. Nobody puts on boxing gloves, though, because the name comes from a different kind of box.

Historians give two explanations for those mystery boxes. Long ago in Britain, servants often worked on Christmas, so they got the next day off to visit their own families, and some employers gave them boxes of gifts or money. Others say churches kept alms boxes, which are boxes for collecting coins to help people in need, and opened them after Christmas. Both ideas are about sharing.

Sharing is still part of the day, because many families spend it visiting grandparents, cousins, and friends. Sports are a big tradition too. In Britain, soccer fans fill stadiums to watch games, and in Australia, a famous yacht race called the Sydney to Hobart sets sail on December 26. Can you picture sailing a boat right after a big holiday dinner?

While sailboats fill the harbor, shoppers fill the stores! Over time, Boxing Day became a big shopping day because stores began offering sales soon after Christmas. Some shoppers even line up before sunrise so they can be first through the doors. Imagine that: a day that may have begun with a simple box of thanks now fills stadiums, harbors, and shopping malls!

It is December 26 in Melbourne, Australia, and the summer sun is blazing. Fans in sun hats stream into the Melbourne Cricket Ground for a cricket match that has become a Boxing Day tradition. Sun hats in December? Yes, because the seasons are flipped south of the equator! Boxing Day comes the day after Christmas in Australia, Britain, Canada, and other countries, and its name is a mystery.

That mystery has puzzled people for a long time, since nobody knows for sure where the name came from. Historians offer two main explanations. One says that servants and workers, who labored on Christmas, received boxes of gifts or money the next day. The other says churches opened their alms boxes, which held coins for people in need, and shared them with the poor on December 26.

Both explanations describe a day of kindness after a busy Christmas, and today many people relax with family. Relatives visit, and tables fill with leftovers such as cold turkey sandwiches. Then comes the sport! In Britain, soccer fans pack stadiums for matches on December 26, while in Canada many families gather around the TV to cheer for hockey.

Cheering crowds are not the only ones out and about, since Boxing Day is also a giant shopping day. Stores in Britain, Canada, and Australia hold big sales, and shoppers line up outside before the doors open. This part of the tradition is much newer than the gift boxes of long ago. Since many people have the day off, stores found that plenty of customers were free to shop.

Shopping bags are not part of the day everywhere, though. In Ireland, December 26 is St. Stephen's Day, honoring an early Christian saint. Some Irish communities hold parades of wren boys, who wear straw costumes and play music. Imagine that: a holiday whose name may come from a simple box now stretches from summer cricket fields to snowy hockey rinks!

Here is a puzzle: on December 26, people in Britain, Canada, Australia, and other countries celebrate a holiday named after a box, yet nobody is completely sure which box! Boxing Day comes the day after Christmas, and it has nothing to do with the sport of boxing. Instead, it is a day for sleeping in, visiting family, watching games, and hunting for bargains. So what is in the box, and why do historians offer more than one answer?

Historians offer a few explanations, and the first begins in the busy kitchens and dining rooms of big English households. Servants and other workers had to serve the Christmas feast, so many were given December 26 off to visit their own families. According to this explanation, employers sent them off with a "Christmas box" holding gifts, coins, or leftover food. Can you picture a worker walking home with a box of holiday treats tucked under one arm?

A second explanation also involves a box, but this one sat inside a church. December 26 is also Saint Stephen's Day, when Christians remember an early follower of Jesus, and some say churches opened their collection boxes on that day. The boxes held alms, an old word for coins and gifts given to help people in need. Nobody can name the exact day the custom began, but people in Britain were using the name Boxing Day by the 1800s.

Giving was only the start, because once the boxes were handed out, people headed outdoors to play and cheer. In Britain, soccer teams play on December 26, and fans bundle up in winter coats to watch. In Australia, where December means summer, tens of thousands of fans watch the Boxing Day Test cricket match in Melbourne, while sailors start the Sydney to Hobart yacht race in Sydney Harbour. Away from the stadiums, many families simply visit relatives and enjoy Christmas leftovers, a tasty echo of those old boxes.

Boxes are still on the move today, because December 26 has become a big sales day in Britain, Canada, Australia, and other places. Stores open early, and some shoppers wait in line before sunrise to grab discounts. Bargain hunters carry home boxes holding everything from toys to televisions. So whether the name began with a servant's gift box or a church's box of coins, boxes are still traveling home in people's arms on December 26, only now one might hold a brand-new TV!

If you think Boxing Day is about punching bags and championship fights, get ready for a surprise! Every December 26, people in Britain, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and other countries celebrate a holiday that has nothing to do with the sport of boxing. Picture a chilly morning in England, where families in wool scarves crowd into a soccer stadium, or a sizzling afternoon in Melbourne, where fans cheer at a cricket match. Back at home, leftover turkey sandwiches, board games, and cousins fill the hours in between. So if nobody is boxing, where did the name come from?

Historians offer a couple of explanations, and both of them involve real boxes. One points to the "Christmas box," a small gift of money that wealthy families gave to servants and to tradespeople who had served them all year. Servants often worked hard on Christmas Day itself, so December 26 became their day to visit relatives, sometimes carrying home a box of leftover food. Another explanation says that churches kept alms boxes, sturdy containers for coins given to people in need, and opened them the day after Christmas to share the money with the poor. Nobody can prove which story came first, which is why the name still feels like a riddle wrapped in a package.

Like any good riddle, this one kept collecting new pieces, and many of them happen outdoors. English soccer fans have packed stadiums on December 26 for generations. In Australia, the Boxing Day Test brings big crowds to the Melbourne Cricket Ground, and on the same day, sleek yachts leave Sydney for a race to Tasmania that has been held since 1945. December 26 is also the feast day of Saint Stephen, an early follower of Jesus, so in Ireland the holiday is often called St. Stephen's Day. Just like that, a day that began with gift boxes grew into a day of stadium roars and ocean spray.

Not everyone spends the day in the stands or on the water, though, because plenty of people are off to the stores instead. Britain made December 26 an official bank holiday in 1871, which meant many workers finally had a guaranteed day off. Over time, shops in Britain, Canada, and Australia began holding big sales, and bargain hunters now line up outside before the doors open. Long ago, employers handed out boxes of gifts to workers; today, stores hand out discounts to shoppers. I find it funny that a day of giving grew into a day of bargains, and yet boxes are still at the center of the story.

Whether people chase bargains or stay home in pajamas, the day still carries something old inside it. That old spirit of giving is still there, since some people use the day to donate to charities or check on neighbors. In my view, that is one reason the holiday has lasted: it stretches the kindness of Christmas a little longer. It also offers families a slow, cozy day to rest after the excitement of December 25. The name may still be a mystery after centuries of guessing, but the message inside the box is easy to read.

If Christmas Day is the big concert, December 26 is the encore, and in many countries the encore has its own name: Boxing Day. Picture the morning after: wrapping paper behind the sofa, leftover turkey turning into sandwiches. In Britain, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and other places with ties to Britain, it is a holiday, and it might mean a soccer match, a family visit, or a dash to the mall. Yet nobody is throwing punches, so what does boxing have to do with it?

The answer has nothing to do with boxers and everything to do with boxes, and historians offer two main explanations. The first is about people who worked while everyone else relaxed. Can you imagine cooking a huge Christmas dinner for a houseful of guests? In wealthy British households of the past, servants did exactly that, and afterward they were often given a box holding a gift, some money, or food to take to their own families. Historians point to a second box as well, one that sat in a church.

That church box was an alms box, a chest where worshippers dropped coins to help people in need. Churches opened these boxes on December 26, the feast day of St. Stephen, and shared the money with the poor. Christians remember Stephen as an early follower of Jesus, and in Ireland the day is still called St. Stephen's Day. Even a carol mentions it: "Good King Wenceslas," with words written by English priest John Mason Neale in the 1800s, opens on "the feast of Stephen" and shows a ruler carrying food to a poor man in winter. No one can prove which box named the day, but both stories describe giving followed by a well-earned rest.

A well-earned rest quickly turned into play, and sports now sit at the heart of many Boxing Day traditions. In Britain, crowds pack soccer stadiums and horse-racing tracks. In Australia, the star is cricket: the Boxing Day Test is played at the Melbourne Cricket Ground, one of the largest stadiums in the world. Also on December 26, the Sydney to Hobart yacht race begins, a contest that started in 1945 and sends crews more than 600 nautical miles to Tasmania. Since December is summer south of the equator, all this action happens under a blazing sun.

Summer sunshine on Boxing Day shows how far the custom has traveled from chilly England. As Britain's empire grew, settlers and officials carried their customs to Canada, Australia, New Zealand and other lands, and the holiday took root. In 1871, a British law listed December 26 among the country's official bank holidays, turning a custom into a rule. Each place added its own flavor: ice skating in chilly Canada, beach picnics in sunny Australia. But a day when so many people are free is also a day when shopkeepers see a chance.

Those shopkeepers had a simple plan: after the Christmas rush, lower the prices and invite everyone in. Today, Boxing Day sales are a big event in Britain, Canada and Australia, and in Canada many stores stretch the deals into a "Boxing Week." Online stores let bargain hunters browse from the sofa in their pajamas. Not everyone joins in, and plenty of families prefer a quiet day of leftovers and board games. It is a neat twist that a day whose name may come from boxes given as thanks now sends so many people home carrying boxes of their own.

On December 26, 1945, a small fleet of yachts bobbed in Sydney Harbour, waiting for a race that began almost as a joke. A group of sailing friends had planned a relaxed cruise to Hobart, Tasmania, until a visiting Royal Navy officer named John Illingworth suggested turning the trip into a contest. His yacht, Rani, won, and the Sydney to Hobart race has set sail every year since, covering about 630 nautical miles of rough ocean. Today thousands of spectators line the shore to watch, all on a date that Australians, Britons, Canadians and others call Boxing Day. Nobody is punching anybody, though, so where did that strange name come from?

Here is the honest answer: historians are not certain, and that uncertainty is what makes the name such a good puzzle. The most popular explanation begins with servants and tradespeople in Britain, who often worked on Christmas Day so that wealthy families could celebrate. The next day, the story goes, employers handed them a “Christmas box,” a small gift of money or goods, and let them go home to their own families. This version has real evidence behind it, because the phrase “Christmas box,” meaning a tip or present, appears in English writing as early as the 1600s. Still, a written phrase shows that such gifts existed, not that they gave December 26 its name.

But a servant’s gift is only half the puzzle, because boxes also turn up in a second explanation with roots in the church. December 26 is St. Stephen’s Day, when many Christians remember Stephen, an early follower of Jesus. Some historians say churches kept alms boxes, where worshippers dropped coins during the season, and opened them on this day to share the money with people in need. The carol “Good King Wenceslas,” with words written by John Mason Neale in 1853, fits that spirit, since it tells of a king carrying food to a poor man on the Feast of Stephen. A third idea, that ships carried sealed boxes of coins for good luck, is repeated by a few writers but has far less support. Because the name “Boxing Day” does not appear in print until the 1700s, the safest conclusion is that several customs may have blended together.

Whichever way the blending happened, the date picked up different names as it traveled. In Ireland, December 26 is St. Stephen’s Day, linked to the old custom of Wren Boys, who paraded from house to house in costume, playing music. Germany and Poland treat it as a Second Christmas Day, a public holiday for even more time with family. South Africa, which once used the name Boxing Day, adopted the name Day of Goodwill in the 1990s. Back in Britain, Parliament passed the Bank Holidays Act in 1871, which named December 26 among the official days off and turned a custom into a shared national break.

A national day off needs something to fill it, and Britain answered with sport. Many English football clubs traditionally play on December 26, and the horse race called the King George VI Chase has long been a Boxing Day highlight at Kempton Park. In Melbourne, Australia, cricket fans gather at the huge Melbourne Cricket Ground for the Boxing Day Test, a match between national teams that can last up to five days. Not a sports fan? The day is just as welcome for quiet visits, when families call on relatives, go for long walks, and turn Christmas leftovers into cold turkey sandwiches.

Once the sandwiches are eaten, though, plenty of people grab their coats and head for the stores, because Boxing Day has also become a shopping day. Retailers in Britain, Canada, Australia and New Zealand advertise big Boxing Day sales, and eager shoppers sometimes wait in line before the doors open. There is a neat irony here: a day that may have begun with employers giving boxes to workers now finds many people buying things for themselves. The shopping habit is far newer than the name, having grown into a major event only in recent decades. Perhaps that is the most surprising thing about Boxing Day: a name that may trace back to a servant carrying a small box home now hangs over a yacht race of about 630 nautical miles, a football crowd, and a bargain hunt.