Winter Season / Snow Theme Unit / Winter Olympics

Let's celebrate the Season of Winter with activities that bring learning to life and make learning fun for all. I love the winter season so come along and have some fun with this educational theme for toddlers, preschool, kindergarten, and all ages. You will find activities, crafts, lesson plans, winter coloring pages, easy instructions, language arts activity sheets, crossword puzzles, wordsearches, word scrambles, research graphic organizers, math, science, books, words to a variety of winter songs and poems, and a list of ideas and resources. You can visit a different season or a month for specific holidays, events, activities, and resources. Make the season come alive with terrific resources for fun. A winter theme offers many opportunities to learn about math and science concepts. When it is cold outside, staying indoors making crafts with the kids becomes a logical choice so check out things that you can do. You can write about this season and all of your favorite things.

If you are a sports enthusiast, you could organize the Winter Olympics for your class or school. You could have participation in the gym in the morning and or in the afternoon. You could practice in gym classes (use big buddies)or assign mixed grade group teams with a teacher leader or gym teacher. Each individual could choose at least 3 or 4 sports to do during a planning meeting. When you are ready, you can proudly march into the gym (using some chants and songs) and sit under a huge flag representing your country. Teams could represent six different countries or more (wearing color-coded t-shirts-red for Canada, blue for the USA, black for Germany, etc.).

Some of the ideas for the Winter Olympics:

a. Torch or baton relay around the gym - passing it on to the next team member. I believe 8 children/team were assigned to this one. You can vary the numbers to fit your group's size.

b. Cross-country skiing - 8 children/team. Children placed recycled 8x12 papers under their feet and shuffled to the other side of the gym where another student did the same back.

c. Bobsledding relay. Children worked in pairs with one child sitting on two scooters. The other child pushed him/her around the periphery of the gym.

d. Curling: children ran up to an assigned line and curled a bean bag onto the curling rings (making tape rings on the floor with assigned points/ring).

e. Slalom skiing was an obstacle course set along the floor. As soon as a team member was sitting down on the other side, the next would go.

f. Hockey: dribble a puck down the floor and shoot for points into a net.

Parent volunteers could count points for the various teams. The teams had to sit down with their legs and arms crossed when the whole team was finished. It was so much fun. There was a big announcement of the winners at the end of the day. You can also do this for a field day for the Summer Olympics.
Resources: http://www.proteacher.org/a/33612_Mini-Winter_Olympics.html

Celebrate the Season of Winter with activities and resources that you can find at

http://geocities.com/mrsjacksonsclass/wintersnow.htm Winter Snow Theme
http://geocities.com/mrsjacksonsclass/winterholidays.htm Winter Holidays

http://geocities.com/mrsjacksonsclass/olympics.htm Winter Olympics

More Winter / Snow/ Season Theme Unit Resources
http://www.teacherplanet.com/resource/winter.php Winter Season Teaching Resources
http://teachers.teach-nology.com/themes/holidays/winter/ Winter Teaching Theme Unit http://www.teach-nology.com/themes/seasons/winoly/ Winter Olympics Teaching Theme Unit http://www.geocities.com/thelearningleapthemes/winterwonderland.html Winter Wonderland Theme Unit-Poems & Ideas
http://www.littlegiraffes.com/winter.html Winter Teaching Theme Unit Ideas
http://stepbystepcc.com/winter.html Winter Theme-Book List, Song, Finger plays & Poems
http://www.enchantedlearning.com/themes/winter.shtml Winter Theme Page
http://www.first-school.ws/theme/seasons_winter.htm Winter Seasonal Theme Preschool
http://www.dltk-holidays.com/winter/index.html Crafts
http://www.preschoolrainbow.org/preschool-winter.htm Winter Theme
http://www.canteach.ca/elementary/songspoems7.html Winter Songs & Poems
http://www.eduref.org/Virtual/Lessons/Science/Animals/ANM0201.html Animals in Winter
http://www.teachingheart.net/xmas.html Great Winter Theme Unit Ideas
http://www.kindergarten-lessons.com/winter_theme.html Winter Math & Science Ideas
http://www.suite101.com/reference/science_experiment Science Experiments
http://www.k-3learningpages.net/web%20winter.htm Winter/ Snow/ Ice Resources
http://webtech.kennesaw.edu/jcheek3/snow.htm Snow/ Winter Resources

Winter Snow Recipe

Here is a classic recipe for winter painting.
Materials: Soap flakes, water, liquid starch, and white powdered tempera.
Description: Mix soap flakes with water into a thick paste. Let children mix with a hand beater. Add a small amount of liquid starch and tempera. Let children create designs by painting with this mixture.

Ivory Snow Painting Recipe
2 parts Ivory Snow or similar soap powder (not liquid)1 part Water You can add food coloring for textured paintings.
Mix Ivory Snow and water and beat until it is the consistency of whipped cream. Divide the mixture into paper cups or small bowls. Use this mixture as you would use any paint with brushes.

You could grow a borax snowflake so see directions at

http://chemistry.about.com/cs/howtos/ht/boraxsnowflake.htm