Snow Activities for Preschoolers

We’re right in the middle of winter, which means it’s snow season here in Iowa! My kids love it, especially when they can go out and play in the snow! I’ve been doing snow activities with my preschooler and I’m excited to share with you what we’ve been up to!

Here’s a quick summary of our snow activities:

alphabet and name recognition with our snowball letters
writing practice in snow cream
counting and one-to-one correspondence with our snowman game
art and fine motor activity with our cute snowman craft
building gross motor skills with our snowball toss and catch
snow science experiment
sensory play with snow slime
singing fun songs about the snow
reading wonderful books about snow

You can read below to see what we’ve been doing and grab the free printables!

Snowball Alphabet Letters

An important skill for preschoolers to work on is recognizing alphabet letters. I created a printable and fun activity to help these little ones learn alphabet letters and even spell their name.

Here’s how you set it up.

Download THIS PRINTABLE and open it up in Adobe Reader.
This printable is editable, meaning you can customize it so the snowballs spell your child’s name. On the last page of the printable, there is a page with empty snowballs. When you open it up in Adobe Reader, you should be able to see blue boxes on the snowballs. Click on the blue box and type in a letter. After you’ve customized it, you can print it.
If you don’t feel like customizing the printable, there’s also an option to print the uppercase or lowercase snowball letters.
Cut out the snowball letters and glue a magnet to the backside.
Practice arranging the letters to create your child’s name. You can place it on a magnetic cookie sheet, refrigerator, or something similar.

Snow Cream Writing

This is a fun sensory activity, as well as a great way to practice beginning writing. It’s really not snow we’re using, just shaving cream! I wanted a fun activity to practice letter and number formations, so I used shaving cream on a tray. You don’t need a lot, but just spray the tray and smooth it down with a spatula. Then have your child practice writing out letter or numbers.

You may want to check out my winter alphabet handwriting sheets to help your child learn to write letters with the correct formations.

Counting Snowman Game

For this activity, children will be counting and working on one-to-one correspondence.

Here’s how to set up the game:

Print off THIS PRINTABLE and cut the sheets in half. Mix them up and set them in a stack.
Set a pile of cotton balls next to the sheets.
On a clear container, draw a face of a snowman. (We used a large Mason jar and printed out a picture of a snowman’s head.)

Here’s how to play the game:

Have your child find a counting sheet, match the cotton balls to the circles, and count them up.
Then pour the cotton balls into the clear container.
Continue playing until all the cotton balls have filled the container.
If you have a child who is in advanced in math, have them count how many cotton balls filled the container!

Snowman Craft

I love this cute craft and I know your preschooler will, too!

Here’s what you need for the craft:

black construction paper
white chalk (or any writing utensil)
small piece of red paper (for scarf and stripe on hat)
small piece of orange paper (for carrot nose)
small piece of black paper (for the hat)
tiny black pom poms (or something similar)
2 googly eyes
glue

Here’s how to make the craft:

Begin by having your preschooler pull apart about 30 cotton balls. This is good for fine motor skills, too!
Draw the snowman outline with chalk on the black paper. Also draw the stick arms.
Have your child squirt glue onto one section of the snowman.
Place the cotton ball pieces on the glue.
Keep doing this until the snowman is filled.
Glue on a red paper scarf around the neck.
Put the face together: glue on two googly eyes, 1 carrot nose, and a mouth
Glue the hat to the top of the snowman. If it starts to flop back, glue a small cotton ball behind the hat.
Hang it up for all to see!

Snowball Toss

This activity is simple and I actually didn’t take any pictures of it. Here’s what you need:

several white socks
beans or rice
laundry baskets

To set up the activity, fill the stocks with either rice or beans. Then tie them off. They should look like the shape of a snowball.

Set laundry baskets across the room. Practice tossing the “snowballs” to the basket.

Other variations include tossing it up and catching it in their hands or tossing it to a friend.

As we tossed our “snowballs”, we sang this chant…

Snowball, snowball, white and round.

It was formed right from the ground.

Now I’ll toss it in the air…

Watch it land right over there!

On the last line of the chant, throw the snowball to the laundry basket.

Snow Science Experiment

This is an observation experiment using snow. Here’s what you need for this activity:

muffin tin
snow
food coloring (optional)
water
Alka-Seltzer tablets

Begin by filling half of the muffin tins with snow. Add a few drops of food coloring to the snow and stir.

Add water to the empty containers. You can also add food coloring, if you’d like. Then place an Alka Seltzer tablet into one compartment with snow and one compartment with water. Observe what happens.

You’ll see that the one with water dissolves MUCH faster than the one with snow. It shows that when things are cold, the reactions are colder. This is a simple experiment, but it demonstrates how temperature affect the rate of the chemical reaction. When the liquid is warm or room temperature, the reaction is quick. When the liquid is cold, the reaction is slower.

If you are interested in more winter science experiments, check out this science packet!