Tuesday, January 10, 2012

Snowman at Night Art and Writing Activity, Snowman Math, Snowman Themed Books, and FREE Download

I wanted to share with you a couple of really fun snowman themed activities I did with my daughter and her friend during our preschool time.
First we read some of our favorite Snowman Themed Books that day:
Snowman at Night by Caralyn Buehner
Snowman at Night is a delightful story that lets your imagination wonder about what snowman do once you go to sleep. Have you ever noticed when you build your snowman that the next day he might be sagging on one side or she might be missing her carrot nose? This book captures snowman sledding, having snowball fights, playing in the snow, etc. that cause the snowman to look a little bit melted and slumped by the morning time.

Usborne Books That's Not My Snowman by Fiona Watt
This book is so well loved by children. Each page has a wonderful hands on sensory item for children to touch and feel. That's Not My Snowman has darling illustrations and it is wonderful for beginning readers to read because of the repetative nature of the sentences. Even though this book is a board book, my 7 and 5 year old daughter still love it. This book is one of several books in Usborne Books "That's Not My..." series.

Sneezy the Snowman byMaureen Wright
Sneezy the Snowman is freezing cold, brrr! He does everything he can think of to get warm but nothing seems to work. One of his last resorts is to stand by a fire which unfortunately causes him to melt. However, the children come to his rescue and figure out how to build him back up again. This book is a fun book to read and I love the whole concept of it.

There Was a Cold Lady Who Swallowed Some Snow by Lucille Colandro
That silly old lady (There Was an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Fly) is at it again, and this time she is swallowing everything snow related. She swallows some snow, a hat, coal, etc.until something special happens at the ending. It is a delightful surprise that you probably won't be able to guess until you get to the end of the book.
 Next we got out our Barilla Piccolin "Mini Rotelle-Wheels" pasta. Boy did we have fun with this!
 I gave my daughter and her friend this "Snowman Math Paper" (free download below). I had them take a handful of their "pasta" snowflakes and glue them down onto their paper. I let them choose the amount. I then had them count how many snowflakes surrounded their snowman and then they wrote down the corresponding amount on the blank line provided. The paper says, "My Snowman has _______ snowflakes". They also colored their snowman. This snowman math activity was so much fun for them.
 We did several pages of "My Winter Activity Book" together that you can read more about HERE. The girls completed the pages "Finish the Snowman" and "When it is cold outside I like to...".

We then made a really fun art project to go along with the book, Snowman at Night. This activity was inspired by, iheartcraftythings.blogspot.com, fingerprint snowman, and I decided to add a creative writing element to it as well.

First I had the girls fingerprint their snowman with white paint on their paper. The girls did all different shapes and sizes of snowman. It was fun to watch. We then took black paint and fingerprinted on the snowman's hats.
While the snowman were drying I had the girls take the pasta wheels (the same pasta we used in the math activity above) and stamp "Snowflakes" all over their paper. So fun right? They loved this part as well.
 Once the snowmen were dry the girls added details to their snowman with markers. I then had them finish the writing prompt, "At night my snowman likes to..." (which you can download below). My daughter put, "At night my snowman likes to throw snowballs at other snowman". It is great to have them compare what they like to do in the cold from the writing activity out of my, "My Winter Activity Book" to what they think their snowman would like to do outside in the cold.
Here is an upclose look at "Little Red's" project. She even named a lot of the snowman on the paper. As you can see she added me (Shauna), my husband, our dogs Buddy and Maddie, as well as herself and her sister ( their names -although they are beautiful- have been covered up).

To get your own FREE COPY of the "Snowman Math Paper" and the Snowman at Night Writing Prompt  CLICK HERE.

Don't forget to check out my other snowman and snow related educational activities and art projects by clicking on the "Winter Printables and Ideas Tab" at the top of my blog.

I hope you enjoy these fun snowman filled activities. We have snow surrounding us at the moment so it is a great time to for us to talk about snowman and all things winter. Tomorrow we will be doing a Penguin Theme for preschool, so I will share our activities sometime soon. What is the weather like where you are at?

4 comments :

Unknown said...

LOVE your idea of using the pasta wheels as snow flakes! How fun! Thanks for the shout out. Your daughter's snowmen turned out so darling! :)

Sue Bullough Burningham said...

Hi Shauna,
Cute blog. You have so many great ideas. I am your newest follower!

Michelle said...

These are adorable, I love the idea of using the pasta to stamp the snowflakes! Thank you for sharing these snowman books and really cute projects to go with them.

So glad that you linked up to stART this week :)

~Michelle @ A Mommy's Adventures

Natalie PlanetSmarty said...

So many great ideas in this unit! Thanks for joining WMCIR.