Winter Science and STEM Ideas

Maybe your like me where there is snow and freezing temperatures...or maybe your in a much warmer spot than me. When the weather starts to stop your students from heading outside because it is way too cold then let's just try some winter science activities inside! Avoid that cabin fever...help your students learn about snow and winter to keep them learning and playing! I am sharing some of my winter K-5th grade activities and ideas that I use in my science classes!

Winter Science Ideas:

1. Science and the Changing seasons is a great science lesson on patterns and cycles in the sky. We make models, I demonstrate, and we make connections with our birthdays!

2. Repel and attract with magnets and ice fishing...yes this is one of my favorites! I give my kinders "fishing poles" (otherwise known as dowels with string and a magnet. They "catch" objects that stick to magnets in a bucket covered with white paper and a hole cut out. We catch and release washer fish, paperclip fish...and more!

3. Animal adaptations, hibernation, and migration is always a great one for animal survival and animal comparisons. From building a den for bear, to learning vocabulary through games, littles love to learn about animals!

4. Polar Bear Blubber and how animals stay warm, add that crisco into a plastic glove and grab that bucket of ice water and learn about animal survival and adaptations!  

5. Snow and Crystals...we learn about how to separate mixtures and solutions. We separate out salt and water and sugar and water through evaporation. You can easily connect how snow is made to connect snow crystals! This year, we poured off some of the salt water onto blue paper to make the perfect salt crystal snowflakes! 

6. Water lessons are perfect for teaching vocabulary such as expand and contract! We have a whole frozen day where we do several fun stations which include: water in a vial with a lid on to see what would happen when soda in a can freezes, we place water in syringes and freeze them to see that water expands, we learn that ice floats and how to test temperature as well as read a thermometer, and we follow it up with water sinking and floating (cold water/blue and hot water/red). Many of these lessons come from FOSS Water Unit, but I adapt and change to help students make connections. We then learn about how real maple syrup is made! Mr and I make our own syrup every spring!

7. Why snow is white...go find that Mystery Science lesson if you have it. It really helps students learn quickly followed by making a snowflake! We then follow up with how to. make a snowflake!

8. What's the Matter Mr. Snowman? is always a second grade favorite! We get snow from outside, you can also use shaved snow from a snow cone maker or even ice chips, we then decorate a cup to look like a snowman with eyes, nose, and mouth, then we add our snow. We measure during our time in science. When we have science next, we discuss what we see. It started off as a solid, turned to a liquid, and now has evaporated. Perfect lesson for the changing states of matter!

9. Chromatography Snowflakes were a hit this year during our mixtures and solutions unit! We learned about chromatography and then tested black markers to see if we could get the colors to separate. We used coffee filters and a cup of water. You can also give them a dropper. We then learned how to cut a snowflake out of our design once it dried!

Need more snow ideas? Check out these packs for additional help. Grab your free snow activity by clicking on the link!

Winter Science and STEM Packs Found HERE!