Six crazy cool ways to explore with snow inside the classroom

The weather here has been all over the place from well below freezing to beautiful blankets of snow. I am not a fan of the freezing but the snow…. well I love it! Snow gives us some crazy cool ways to explore both outside and in the classroom. For this post, I will share how we explored snow inside the classroom.

Snowball Discussion

Bringing a tub of snow to your circletime will lead to lots of interesting discussion! We read a book about snow, then let the children take a few minutes to discuss and explore the snow right there on the floor. We discovered how the snow is super cold and will melt in our hands if we hold it long enough. We used words like cold, frozen, melt, winter, white, fluffy, icy, frosty, snowballs, big, little, round, hard, soft, and lots of other descriptive words.

Small World Snow Play

Miss Lauren set up a small world winter play station using animals, logs, rocks, and snow. Of course, the children needed their gloves to play in this chili center!

Color Mixing on Snow

Nothing sparks interest and curiosity like a big pile of snow in the center of the table.

But this table was really about color mixing. Miss Lauren set out liquid watercolors (with a little water added) and pipettes and the children went to town mixing colors all throughout the morning.

Snow Science

Will our snow melt inside the classroom? Why will it melt? How long will it take our snow to melt? These are the kinds of questions we asked as the children placed their snowballs inside a baggie and left them out for the day. Turns out that some of the snowballs melted quickly while others took longer. Why is that? Were all the snowballs the same size? Which size of snowballs melted faster? Slower?

Snowball Math

Snowball math is a fabulous way to invite the children to count, measure, compare, and contrast. The children worked together to make as many snowballs as they could and lined them up across the floor like a number line. We then took the time to count how many snowballs we made and how the snowballs were of all different sizes. Before they all melted, we hurried up and tossed all the snowballs back into our tub of snow.

Snowball Roller Painting

In our most recent online Discover Conference, we learned that Process Art is all about creating artful experiences. This was definitely an artful experience. The children formed up their own snowballs then tossed them into a box along with some paint and paper. The children worked together to roll the snowballs back and forth through the paint and across the paper. It didn’t take long for our paper to get pretty wet as the snowballs started to melt and mix with the paint but the process was super cool.

Available on Amazon

Here are a few of the books we read to go along with our explorations of snow inside the classroom…

Deborah J Stewart

Deborah J Stewart

Every time I think I know everything I need to know about teaching young children, God says, "Hold on a minute!" and gives me a new challenge.

Let me tell ya...

With each new challenge that you overcome, you will find yourself better equipped and more passionate about teaching young children.

God didn't call wimps to lead, teach, or care for His children. Nope, he has high expectations, so get ready. You will have to give your very best but after teaching for over 30 years, I can tell you that it is a wonderful and rewarding journey.

Whenever your calling feels hard, just remember, 'He who began a good work in you (and in the children you serve) will be faithful to complete it.'

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