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Thursday, January 26, 2012

More snowy activities in preschool

By Laura Eldredge

Unusual for this time of year in Connecticut ... we haven't seen much snow so far. Oh yes, we had a HUGE snowstorm in October (when no one was prepared for it) ... but so far January has been very light on the white stuff.

But, that hasn't stopped us from planning lots of "snowman" related activities to do inside that encourage learning and exploration! Here are a couple of my favorites, and some books that you can use to accompany them.


Edible snowmen

By far, my FAVORITE activity of the year! So simple to execute ... and fun for the children to see! Here are the steps to make these adorable edible melting snowmen:
  1. Take a marshmallow and make a snowman face using food coloring markers (these are very easy for adults AND children to work with - and it's edible).
  2. Then, place it on top of one striped cookie (you can substitute other types of cookies, like graham crackers or nilla wafers or any type of cookie that you wish).
  3. Place them in the microwave for 10 seconds.
  4. Take them out ... and show the children how their snowman MELTED!

Before doing this activity, you can have a discussion about what happens to real snowmen when the weather gets warm (they melt) and talk about why that happens. After having children make their own marshmallow snowman, ask them what they think will happen to it when you put it in the microwave or oven. If their marshmallow snowmen get hot, what will happen to them? And there you can touch upon the scientific concept of melting (properties of matter) and have them make predictions.

They will really get a kick out of seeing their snowman MELT! Top it off with another cookie, and it tastes like a s'more!


Since the main topic is the melting of the snowman, there are some lovely children's books that go with this theme and can lead to further discussion. A few books I like to use with this activity are:
The Smiley Snowman, Where do Snowmen go? or Snowmen at Night.


These stories all provide an imaginative "alternate" theory on why snowmen look droopy after a few days, which is a lot of fun for children to envision and explore. You can encourage the children to try and come up with their own alternate theories as a literacy activity.

We had a few other fun snowy activities these past few weeks, such as ...


Making Snow Dough

Snowpeople (and other creations) were made with our
Snow Dough!




Learning about colors with snowmen

We used the idea that Deborah Chitwood talked about in her Montessori-Inspired Snowman Color Activities post and had fun sorting snowmen hats and pony beads beads by color!




Snowman pancakes

This we did one Saturday morning when we did have a little snow fall on the ground. Here was our crack at making some snowman pancakes!



PreK + K sharing SNOWY roundup!

Need more "snowy day" inpiration? We've had several snow posts on the preK + K sharing blog already! Here's a round up!




Laura Eldredge is a teacher and curriculum coordinator at a NAEYC accredited early childhood program in Connecticut. She also co-founded the website
The SEEDS Network, as a way to provide early childhood professionals with ideas and resources that support them in their quest to provide quality care and education to our youngest learners. She blogs at www.theseedsblog.com.

5 comments:

  1. Laura, these are FABULOUS ideas!!! I made your Edible Snowmen this year and gave them out as gifts--they were a BIG hit!!!! You've got a few new ideas here that I can't wait to try, as well! What a great idea to share some of the other "Snowy" posts, too! :))

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  2. Love the melting snowman idea! The kids would get a kick out that.
    Lori
    Conversations in Literacy

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  3. Thanks Ayn - I knew you got a kick out of the marshmallow snowmen ... so I figured it was worth sharing again! We still haven't gotten too much snow here in the Northeast ... what little we got last weekend has already melted. But we can still enjoy the snowy ideas inside!

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  4. Thanks for commenting, Lori! The melting snowmen are a hit everytime I do it!

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  5. Great snowy day activities, Laura! We haven't had much snow in Colorado, either. It's great that there are so many fun "snow" activities that can be done anyway. Thanks for linking to my post! I pinned your post to my Kids' Winter Activities Pinterest board at http://pinterest.com/debchitwood/kids-winter-activities/

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