These winter months can feel cold and just too long, but don’t worry! Sprinkle some warmth and joy into your classroom this year with these 5 enchanting snow activities for first graders. These activities and creative crafts will add so much fun to your classroom during this time of year.
- Hide and Seek Snowman Game
- Penguin Craft
- Snowman Directed Drawing and Writing Activity
- Indoor Snowball Game
- Winter FREEZE Movement Game
Hide and Seek Snowman Game
First on your list for winter fun with your first graders— this hide and seek snowman pocket chart game!
Kids love this one! They practice reading words and guessing where the snowman is hiding. You can add your own words, math equations, and more so this game can be reused and played ALL winter!
Penguin Craft
Next up is this super engaging penguin craft with writing prompts!
Use this activity in your classroom a few different ways:
- Choose between coloring or cut and glue options
- Pick the writing prompt that best fits your objective and individual students
- Display the finished projects on a bulletin board or in the hallway for a festive touch!
With creative or informational writing prompts and craft or coloring options, this resource fits any classroom and schedule.
Snowman Directed Drawing and Writing Activity
The third snow activity to use with your students is a little out of the box– but in the best of ways!
Engage your kids with a snowman-directed drawing lesson. This lesson is designed to teach transition words, but it’s SNOW much fun that it never feels like work!
You can project the lesson slides on your board and then teach Frosty how to add transition words to his writing.
Indoor Snowball Game
If you’ve never played an indoor snowball game with your kids, you’re missing out! You can use this activity to practice anything– letters, sight words, math, vocabulary, you name it!
Here’s how you play:
- Write a letter, word, or problem on each snowball and crumple it up.
- Have your students sit in a circle and give them each at least one snowball.
- When you say GO, everyone throws their snowballs into the middle.
- They grab one and write the letter, word, or problem on their recording pages.
- Keep playing until your whole recording sheet is full.
Winter FREEZE Movement Game
And finally, forget the winter blues and indoor recess headaches… your kids will love playing the winter words FREEZE game in the classroom! Play it again and again as long as you want or need to.
Teacher WIN– it gets them moving too!
Here’s how to play:
- Give each student a winter word picture card.
- Play some fun music. As the music plays, students trade cards as they dance and move around.
- Pause the music and everyone must FREEZE!
- Read a Who has _? card. Whoever is holding that card wins that round!
- Start the music and keep playing!
MORE Winter Ideas
Okay… so we said just 5 snow activities for first graders, but there are SNOW many more great ideas. You just have to know a few more!
Indoor Igloo
First up– build a winter igloo with your students! Use white trays and a little paper to create the perfect indoor igloo.
You can use this as a cute winter display for your classroom or hallway or as the neatest backdrop for classroom pictures!
Snowy Day Landscape Directed Drawing
This directed drawing lesson can give so much skill and confidence to little learners! It also requires attention and following directions– big bonus!
Hop on over to Art for Kids Hub with Rob and his son Jack as they share how to draw a beautiful winter landscape. His detailed lessons make it easy for even the newest artist to follow along!
Hot Cocoa Day
You really can’t skip the chance to plan a fun hot cocoa day for your students during the chilly winter time! Use this winter math activity and craft as the perfect way to combine place value practice with something delicious.
Students will enjoy a warm winter drink while working through this comparison craftivity to learn about tens and ones.
Winter Sight Word Games
Now for the last one, really…. use these three easy winter sight word games! You can play with any group and any list of words:
- SNOW Much Fun Sight Word Game
- Let’s Build a Snowman Sight Word Game
- It’s Snowing Sight Words
As you embrace winter in your classroom this year, these snow activities for first graders are sure to add just the sparkle and fun you all need.
Your students are lucky to have a teacher searching for new ideas to share with them. Happy Winter!
2 Responses
Thank you so much for the Snowball Game Freebie!!!! I appreciate your generosity very much!
Thank you so much for your feedback Shannon! I hope your kids love playing!
Happy Teaching!
Emily