Those of us north of temperate climates have become accustomed to assuming that the outdoors time of year is over when winter arrives. Show and tell your Kindergarten students that it is not true! Temperature is a factor; wind is a bigger factor, but we can enjoy class outside on any day that we can enjoy recess outside.
Overall Expectations:
Curriculum expectations are always based on the Ontario Ministry of
Expectations. Many of the activities will reinforce, rather than teach,
those expectations. As such, no assessment ideas or rubrics are
included.
- demonstrate an awareness of the natural and built environment through hands-on investigations, observations, questions, and representations of their findings;
- conduct simple investigations through free exploration, focused exploration, and guided activity, using inquiry skills (questioning, planning, predicting, observing, communicating);
- use technological problem-solving skills (questioning, planning, predicting, constructing, observing, communicating) in free exploration, focused exploration, and guided activity.
- demonstrate an understanding of the natural world and the need to care for and respect the environment;
(Most winter activity ideas below are adapted from Nature for the Very Young by Marcia Bowden New York: John Wiley & Sons, 1989)
This time of year, with the coats and boots and mittens and hats and snow pants..., instead of getting dressed to go outside an additional time, stay outside after a recess.
Birds
Go or stay outside for brief outdoor learning visits in order to teach students to identify some common birds. They can learn to ID them the way birders do: according to five characteristics: size, shape, color, behavior (including bird calls), and habitat.
Consider putting this Bird ID app on your smart phone. It's a big one, but once you have it, you're good to go without data or WiFi. Whenever you and your students are outside looking at a bird, you can use the Explore Birds option on the app to input your location, and the date. Then it will show and tell you the birds likely to be in your area at that time of year. You will see the bird's pictures and hear their calls and songs. Your students will love it! Get the children to stand around you in a wide half-circle around you so that you can show them the pictures on your phone in an orderly way.
Easy birds to ID are chickadees, robins, woodpeckers, blue jays and cardinals. Other birds that may have been spotted in your school yard are sparrows, killdeer, starlings, red-tailed hawks, goldfinches and Canada Geese.
Fun Fact: Many birds look plumper in winter not because they have fattened themselves up, but because they fluff up their feathers to hold on to more warmth.
Cardinals
During the winter, cardinals do not migrate. Their favorite food is black oil sunflower seeds and their favorite feeder is a tray. Consider putting up a tray outside the kindergarten window and refilling it regularly. Students will be able to see the cardinals' beaks, with its seed-eating shape. They will be able to ID other birds with such beaks as seed-eaters. Sparrows are another example.
Snow
After one of the season's first snowfalls, go outside to discover tracks. Observe things about the students' own tracks.
Then take a bucket of snow inside. They will be able to observe that snow turns to water, but also that it takes a lot of snow to make just a little water (ratio 10:1). You could even freeze some water and boil some to introduce students to the science concept called 'change of state', from solid to liquid to gas.
Play a game of hide and seek. Get some students to hide a number of white objects on the snow in a defined area on the playground. The rest of the students can go and find them. This will reinforce learning about camouflage in a fun way.
During a snow fall, give each student a 4x6 or similar sized piece of black card. Students can catch snow flakes on the card and examine them with magnifying glasses. This will reinforce the fact that each snow flake is different.
As you probably know, there is nothing like seeing the winter world through the eyes of young children. Enjoy!
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