Snow can be such an exciting theme for the preschool classroom especially if you teach in the south where snow is hardly experienced. All kids love snow and bringing it into the classroom can really excite and teach the kids about seasons.
How do we plan our day around snow? Here are few activities to bring the theme of snow and snowmen into all centers in the classroom.
Story time
There are so many books that work with this theme. My suggestion is to place white felt on the floor to sit on during story time. You can also fill a wading pool with packing peanuts for the kids to sit in while you read. This is, of course, depending on your class size. Mouse's First Snow by Lauren Thompson is a cute story about a mouse experiencing snow for the first time. It is a cute story about what the mouse thought snow was at first site, etc. Kids love it. Another fun story is Snowmen at Night by Caralyn Buehner. It is a cute story about what Snowmen "really" do at night. Frozen Noses by Jan Car is another book about kids who bundle up to go outside.
Circle time/Music Time
There are so many cute fingerplays and songs that have to do with snowmen. One such fingerplay involves some preplanning. Be sure to grab a bag of cotton balls for at the end.
Snowflakes Hiding In a Cloud
Little snowflakes hiding in a cloud (hide face with hands)
Little snowflakes soft and round (put arms above hand to form circle)
Little snowflakes falling for me (move fingers down while wiggling fingers)
How many snowflakes do you see? (throw cotton balls up in the air over the kids heads as a surprise)
Five Little Snowmen-this finger play works well with a felt board or five snowmen stick puppets
Five little snowmen were very fat,
Each one wore a funny hat;
Out came the sun and melted one,
And four little snowmen stood in the sun.
(continue down to one)
One little snowman was very sad,
He still had his funny hat,
Down came the now
And the children played,
And built four more snowmen on that winter's day.
Art Time
Chalk drawing-Allow the kids to draw a snow scene on black paper with white chalk. Another activity is to glue cotton balls to make a snowman. You can also make a snowman out of marshmallows or modeling clay. You can use googly eyes or buttons and toothpicks to decorate. You can also make a snow picture by gluing popcorn to black construction paper. The teacher can also cut out three big circles out of white butcher paper and allow the kids to stick the eyes, nose, buttons, scarf, etc to the snowmen on the wall.
Homeliving
Place winter clothes for the kids to dress up in during this center. Roll up white socks for a pretend snowball fight. You can also take a paint bucket and decorate as a coffee cup. Then wad up white pieces of paper. Have the kids try to throw the "marshmallows" into the cup. Finally a fun activity is to allow the kids to make real snowmen cookies with cookie cutters or do the same out of playdoh,
Sensory table
Check out steve spangler science to buy magic snow. The kids will love playing with it and it even feels cold.
There are so many activities you can do with the snow theme. You can count snowballs as you throw them in the air. You can match snowflakes based on color or style. Feel free to leave any other suggestions in the comment section below
