Winter Weather

Welcome to Blue Bird Day’s Weekly Lesson Plans. This week we’re working on the theme Winter Weather! Read below for more themed lesson plans and activities.

Table Time Activity: Winter Clothing Match-Up

Skill Check

The goal of this activity is to learn and label the names and images of body parts and clothing through matching.

Growing My Skills

1. Follow link to image and print.

2. Gather glue.

3. Parent will cut out winter clothing.

4. Match the correct clothing item to the corresponding body part using glue.

Floortime Play Activity: Dress Up and Pretend Snow Fight

Materials:

Gloves or mittens.

Hat.

Scarf.

Boots.

Snowsuit.

Paper balls or cotton balls.

Skill Check

The goal of this activity is to promote awareness to winter clothing, support dressing skills, and pretend play. There should be limited structure and lots of pretend play with snowball fights!

Growing My Skills

Expand this activity by talking to your child about cold weather versus hot weather. Label the clothing items and colors. Bring in a stuffed animal and dress the stuffed animal also!

Relaxation Time Activity: Make a Snow Globe and Watch the Snow Fall while Listening to Relaxing Music!

Materials:

Glass Jar.

Water.

Glitter or Sequins.

Any additional decorations to add!

Skill Check

The goal of this activity is to help you child engage and participate in learning coping strategies/exercises. Using the snow globe as a coping tool to calm your body down/redirect attention/engage in surrounding.

Growing My Skills

1. Add water to a glass jar.

2. Add sequins or glitter.

3. Decorate the outside of the jar with stickers, paint markers, etc.

4. Use the snow globe while practicing deep breathing.

Creative Time Activity: Cotton Ball Snowman Craft

Materials:

Cotton Balls.

Black Construction Paper Eye Cut Outs.

Snowman Template.

Skill Check

The goal of this activity is to help your child follow directions and build their creative and fine motor skills. This is also a great opportunity to practice shape and number recognition, label body parts, and identify different colors that are on their snowman!

Growing My Skills

1. Parents – trace a circle and triangle for your child to cut.

2. Cut out eyes and a nose using black and orange construction paper.

3. Glue cotton balls on to snowman template.

4. Glue eyes and nose onto snowman. You can also add a hat, scarf, and arms!

Movement Time Activity: Shoveling Snow

Materials:

“Snow”– you can have your child shovel real snow outside, or use crumpled up pieces of paper, balled socks, or small balls.

Shovel (you may also use a broom if you don’t want to bring a shovel inside).

Skill Check

The goal of this week is to work on postural stability and bilateral upper extremity coordination and strengthening by shoveling some “snow”!

Growing My Skills

Scatter “snowballs” on the ground, and have your child try to shovel them all up and put them in the bin.

Your child may need you to model how to hold and utilize the shovel. If the shovel is adult-sized, you can have them hold closer to the head of the shovel while you hold the back of the handle to help them manage the weight and control their movements.

You can also have them clean up the snow by tossing the snowballs into the bin/bucket, working on throwing skills and visual motor coordination.

Mealtime Activity: Edible Snowflakes (Aka Tortillas)

Materials:

Flour or soft tortillas.

Scissors or a pairing knife.

Preferred tortilla ingredients.

Skill Check

The goal of this activity is to give a new twist to a preferred snack – or to introduce new/non preferred snacks between tortillas.

Growing My Skills

Needed: tortillas and filling (i.e. cheese, guacamole, salsa, cream cheese, strawberry jam, various fruit jams, etc.)

Cut out a snowflake pattern in the tortilla: see examples.

Two options for preparation:

1. Hot: Cut out tortilla snowflake pattern, bake tortillas for 7 minutes and eat as a cookie.

2. Cold: take 2 tortillas, cut one in a snowflake pattern and leave the other. Place food between tortillas for sampling.

Language Time Activity: Reading Time

Materials:

Book: The Mitten by Jan Brett

Enjoy some quiet time together by reading this classic book!

Skill Check

The goal of this week is to work on your child’s receptive language skills. Reading books together is a great time to work on a number of skills: answering “wh-” questions (i.e., who, what, where, when), labeling or pointing to pictures, or sequencing events of the story!

Growing My Skills

Work on responding to various wh-questions throughout the story (who, what, where, what-doing, when).

After the book is over, work on language organization and executive functioning skills by talking about which animals came first, next, and last.

Expand your child’s vocabulary and receptive language skills by pointing to different animal pictures in the story when you name them.