So Many Snowmen!!

Happy Thursday!!  In my district we are approaching the end of the second marking period.  So today and tomorrow are Professional Development days.  We were given ALL DAY TODAY to work together on planning and getting things done in our rooms.  How often does that happen?!?!?!

Since we are in the season of winter, and in my area of the world we have a definite four seasons.  During winter we get lots of cold weather, snow, and ice.  We have had FIVE days of no school due to weather so far this winter, and we haven't even gotten to our snowiest month yet!!  Since there's been so much snow lately, that has been a huge topic of conversation in kindergarten.  SSOO, we are taking advantage of their interest and have been doing a lot of talking about snowmen.  We have been reading the books by Caralyn Buehner and the kiddos LOVE them!!  I'm sure you're familiar with her work!!  They just LOVE to look for Mr. Pickle Nose!!  Since we are learning about seasons in Science, we chose to read one of her newer books Snowmen All Year.  We discussed the different seasons and the activities you could do outside during that season.  After reading, the students were to choose a season and then write about an activity you could do outside during that season.

They were to draw a snowman on black construction paper using white crayons, and they were to use the regular colors to add details to their pictures.

Here's the bulletin board in the hallway that is displaying the work of my kiddos.

The students were to copy their season word and then stretchy-snake spell their outdoor activity.

It was neat to see the different seasons they chose as well as the activities they would do during that season.

We've been working REALLY HARD on sounding out our words and writing the sounds that we hear!

I LOVE all the details they used in their pictures!  How cool is this snowball fight during the winter!?!?

Last one!  This one is from my team mate Heather's class.  I just loved the swimming pool!!


If you'd like to complete this activity with your littles, I'm sharing the writing prompt that we used with this activity.  I hope your kiddos have as much fun with it as mine did!!

At the Art Center Table, my littles are working on using white paint and scraps of construction paper to create an abstract snowman.  We told them it didn't have to look exactly like a snowman and that they should just be as creative as possible.  They have been LOVING it, though I'm thinking part of that has to do with getting to use paint!

Here's the materials they were allowed to use to create their snowmen. (We're working on cleaning up the areas we are in before we leave them!)

Here are some of the finished snowmen that my littles have done.  I think they are SO SUPER CUTE!!

Finally, we have been using snowmen in our math activities.  My Pinteresting team mate Heather found the snowman art activity and the mat activity while surfing through Pinterest.  In math, we have been working on the terms 'greater than', 'less than', and 'equal to'.  The students were each given one 'snowball' (a white paper circle) for each letter of their first name.  They were to write each letter of their name on a snowball and then glue it down to make it a snowman.  Finally, they were to think of a math sentence that would compare their name to someone else in their group.  They could say their name had more, less, or an equal amount of letters as someone else in their group.

We used speech bubbles to write the comparing sentence (because they were small, I wrote the sentence for them).

This is one of the groups from Heather's class.  Apparently I wasn't listening very closely when she explained this activity because I missed the part where they were to use an extra circle as the snowman's head.  My kids have headless snowmen!!!

I hope you and your kiddos are enjoying the weather wherever you are!