It's February and Yes~Winter is Still Here!

 

The crisp and often snowy days of February are perfect days to stay inside and curl up with a good book or two.

 

Below are some great suggestions for Snow Day reading for the kiddos in preschool through second grade.

 

Snowmen at Night by Caralyn Buehner and Mark Buehner

This book provides a delightful story about the hilarious antics of a group of adventure-seeking snowmen.

 

Tracks in the Snow by Wong Herbert Yee

Told in rhyme, this story is about discovery and imagination. Does a hippo really like the snow?

The Biggest Snowman Ever by Steven Kroll and Jeni Bassett

This easy-to-read story reinforces the importance of teamwork.

 

Sometimes Snow Falls in the Summer by Deb Troehler

This tale is a gentle story of a granddaughter’s visit with her grandmother where anything is possible..

The Snowy Day by Ezra Jack Keats

This timeless story tells of the adventure of a little boy that discovers the wonders of snow.

Snowflake Bentley by Jacqueline Briggs Martin and Mary Azarian

This story follows the life of the man who not only explored the beauty in nature but also shared his findings with the world.

 

Snow! Snow! Let the Winds Blow!

We all know the weather patterns—hot in summer and cold in winter? Or, is that correct? This year alone we’ve had temperatures in the 80s with torrential rains followed by bone chilling, pipe bursting temperatures so cold that schools and businesses were closed. These extreme weather swings took place in the month of January. Climate change is more than likely the cause of our now-familiar roller coaster weather patterns.

Why not tap into these changes in weather patterns to create a snowman glyph?

Today’s post includes instructions and printables to use with your children to practice recording and interpreting data, create and interpret bar graphs, and improve fine motor skills. As an added bonus, I am including a  set of snowflake-themed printables for you to use with the kiddos. So, when the winds are howling and the snow is blowing, you can stay inside warm and snug and still enjoy the snowflakes.

HOW WOULD YOU BUILD YOUR SNOWMAN GLYPH? 

OBJECTIVE: Demonstrate the ability to read and interpret glyphs.

*Please note that younger children may need assistance with cutting the snowman components.

MATERIALS NEEDED

Printouts provided with this lesson*

Scissors and glue

 

INSTRUCTIONS

1. Prior to the activity, prepare a snowman glyph with your personal choices for the snowman components. Show your completed snowman to the children, along with the key.

Ask: Looking at the snowman that I made and the key, what do you think my favorite candy is? What type of shoes do I like to wear?

Explain that the children are going to create their own snowmen, based on their favorite things.

2. Show the key to the children. Discuss the options to use for each category.

3. Give the snowman printout and the component printouts to the children, instructing them to build their own snowman based on their choices.

4. When the glyphs are completed, children will share their choices to reinforce reading the glyph with the Snowman Glyph Key.

Snowmen and a Snow Fort

Use the completed glyphs to build a bar graph showing the total number of children who chose each component, as shown.

MODIFICATION: Children create a glyph based upon their favorite season. Create a bar or pictograph of the results.

 

 

ARE YOU A RAINBOW, A SNOWFLAKE, OR A LITTLE BIT OF BOTH?

 

Rainbows and snowflakes are true contrasts of nature. To best experience the splendor of a rainbow, we must pause, step back, and gaze from a distance. A snowflake, on the other hand, implores us to draw close. We must capture the fleeting beauty of winter’s masterpiece as it quickly blends into a snowdrift.

In many ways we are a blend of both rainbows and snowflakes. Some of our qualities are rainbow bold, easily noticed by others. However, each of us also possesses wonderful talents that can be easily missed. Like a quietly drifting snowflake, these talents implore others to draw closer to truly appreciate the traits that make each of us a unique snowflake.

As you and your child create today’s activity, take time to explore how wonderfully unique you are.

ARE YOU A RAINBOW OR A SNOWFLAKE, OR A LITTLE BIT OF BOTH?

SECONDARY RAINBOW SHOWN

 

Today’s activity is a colorful spin on the traditional silhouette-perfect fun for those rainy days waiting inside for the rainbow to signify the rain has come to an end.

Age range: Fun for all

Time to complete: 45-60 minutes

MATERIALS:
Thick drawing paper or card stock
White paper
Bright light source for silhouette creation
Pencil
7 cotton balls
Colored pencils* (red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, violet)

Scissors

Repositionable adhesive

*This activity can also be completed with crayons or tempera paints.

INSTRUCTIONS: **

**Some of the instructions are intended for completion by an adult. Those steps will have a ** prior to the step.

1. ** Using a bright light against a white wall, trace the silhouette of your child.

            a. Tape a piece of white copy paper to the wall directly behind where your child is sitting.

            b. Shine the light on the profile of your child and trace the shadow formed by the bright light.

2. **Make a copy of the drawing to use for the project and cut out the copy. (You will use the silhouette for the project.)

3. Create the paper snowflake:

            a. Trace and cut a circle that is 4 inches in diameter out of white paper.
            b. Fold the paper in half, as shown.
            c. Fold the half circle into thirds, creating 6 sections.
            d. Draw and cut a decorative V shape at the curved edge. You will leave at least 1" edge not cut, to form the snowflake stencil.
            e. Open and flatten the paper snowflake. (You will use the outside portion of the snowflake for the project.

4. Prepare the materials for the coloring portion of the activity.
            a. Draw a heavy block of each color on a white sheet of paper. This will be used for the cotton ball ‘painting’.

            b. Load the color onto the cotton balls by rubbing the cotton balls back and forth across the colored blocks. You may have to reload from time to time.

5.**Spread a thin layer of repositionable adhesive to the back of the silhouette.

6.**Attach the silhouette to a blank sheet of heavy paper.

7. Beginning with either the red or the violet colors, rub the cotton balls onto the paper, around the edges. Complete these in order to create either a primary rainbow or a secondary rainbow. A secondary rainbow was used for this activity.

8.**When all seven colors have been used, carefully remove the paper silhouette.

 

9. Repeat steps 5, 6, and 7 for the snowflake, placing the snowflake inside the silhouette.

Hint: If you plan to use paint for the project, allow the paint to dry thoroughly before removing the silhouette and snowflake.

For additional rainbow and snowflake-related activities, please check out my activity book posted below. The book is available on Amazon.

 

Today’s post includes the eighth and final activity from the Sizzling Summer Snow Day Unit. While your children may be too old to complete the activity, they might be interested in helping out their younger siblings.

Please email me for a printable pdf of the snowmanpoem and worksheet.

ACTIVITY 8: SILLY SNOWMAN AND HIS SILLY SEASONS

This short activity is a great way to end the day of winter-in-the-summer play. It’s a quick reminder about how each season is different from the next, with a bit of overlap in between. The activity is intended for the younger children, but the older kids might have fun helping out.

Ages: 4-6

Time to complete: 15-20 minutes

Materials:

Copy of the Silly Snowman poem

Copy of the seasonal snowman sheet

Scissors and glue

INSTRUCTIONS:

1. Read the poem to the children.

2. Discuss how each season is different in your area (or possibly similar).

3. Show the seasonal snowman sheet to the children and discuss how each season is represented.

4. Help the children match the season words to the correct seasonal snowman.

 

The Temps are in the 90s~Time to Jump into the Deep End of the Pool

Welcome to my first post on Rainbows2Snowflakes. While I definitely know what direction I intend to take with this blog, I will more than likely modify the paths I travel to reach the final destination.

Rainbows2Snowflakes is intended to be a friendly and informative online space to distribute and share ideas for activities, projects, and children’s literature. As we are all forever learners, many of the activities will appeal to a wide audience and age range. However, for the duration of this summer, the posts and ideas will be geared towards children ages four through eight.

Since summer has unofficially begun and the pools are now open, I thought I’d join in with the summer fun and jump right into the deep end of the blog pool with my first activity from The Sizzling Summer Snow Day thematic unit. Over the course of the next few weeks, I will post different ideas and activities from this summer unit. Some of them are easy to do with few materials required and some of the activities are more elaborate and require careful planning. When all activities have been added, I will add a link to the entire unit, just in time for the super sizzling days of July and August.

Activity 1—Sticky Snowman Snowball Sort—Twice the Fun

Marshmallows are such entertaining treats. They squish. They roll. They stick to just about anything. This marshmallow-themed activity will provide both a fun afternoon of learning and play as well as an educational boost for the little ones in your life.

Ages: 3-8

Time to complete: Part 1—15-20 minutes; Part 2—45-60 minutes

Hint: To make sure your children have super clean hands for this activity, instead of singing the usual Happy Birthday song while they was their hands, sing Jingle Bells while they splash in the soap and water. The kids will love singing the Christmas song in the summer and they will have squeaky clean hands when they are ready to dive into the bowl of mixed-up marshmallows.

Materials:

4 nesting bowls

3 small bowls, 1 cup sized

3 bags of marshmallows in 3 sizes (available in big box stores)

Rice Treat ingredients—1 10 oz. bag marshmallows, 3 TBSP butter, 1 tsp vanilla, 6 cups rice cereal

Embellishments: Mini M & Ms, fruit rolls, pretzels, powdered sugar (optional)

Cookie sheet coated with non-stick spray

How big is your marshmallow—Part One

Instructions:

1. Prior to the activity, place the marshmallows in the largest bowl, making sure they are mixed, as shown.

 

2. Arrange the remaining bowls by size from smallest to largest in front of the large bowl.

3. Discuss the sizes of the three types of marshmallows.

4. Sort the marshmallows by size into the corresponding bowl.

 

Make the fun count by counting your snowballs

Use three 1 cup sized bowls and have the children predict how many marshmallows of each size it would take to fill that bowl. Fill the bowls, one at a time, with each size marshmallow. Count the total number of marshmallows it takes to fill the bowl.

Ask: Why did it take more of the small marshmallows to fill the bowl than the other two sizes?

 

Create a Crispy Summer Snowman—Part Two

 

A fun follow-up activity to the marshmallow sort, this activity uses the marshmallows from Part One and continues to reinforce the concepts of comparing items by size as well as counting skills.

Instructions:

Hint: Step 1 should be completed by an adult.

 

1. Create the marshmallow treats.

            a. Melt the butter over low heat.

            b. Melt the marshmallows by stirring them in the melted butter over low heat.

            c. Remove the melted mixture from the heat and stir in the vanilla.

            d. Stir in the rice cereal until coated with the melted marshmallow mixture.

2. To prevent the mixture from sticking to your hands, apply a coating of butter to the palms of your hands.

3. Grab three clumps of the mixture and place them on a cookie sheet coated with non-stick spray, making sure there are three different-sized clumps.

 

4. Roll the clumps into firm ball shapes and allow to stiffen slightly before proceeding to Step 5.

5. (Optional) Roll each of the balls in a layer of powered sugar, leaving a quarter-sized area that is not coated. The uncoated area will be used to help the balls stick together to form the snowman.

 

6. Assemble the snowman by placing the balls from largest to smallest, pressing them together to stick.

7. Decorate the snowman with the candy, fruit roll, and pretzels.

 

Have fun with this activity!