Winter
Background Information & Activities

Learning about seasons and weather helps your children understand the natural world around us. Invite your children to share their experiences with weather and seasons and then build on their knowledge to teach how and why seasons and weather change. We recommend screening Seasons before watching other movies on specific seasons to provide a general overview and to review basic science concepts. The Winter movie goes more in depth about the season and explains how Earth’s axis and orbit around the Sun causes winter. It also discusses a few key weather conditions, such as rain, snow, and sleet.

Have your children discuss what winter is like in your area. You may want to use a thermometer to measure outdoor temperatures during the winter and throughout other seasons. This provides a great practice for children to use a thermometer and collect data. Explain that in many areas, winter is the coldest season of the year. What kind of weather occurs during winter? Precipitation is water that falls to Earth from the sky. Snow and rain are both kinds of precipitation. Sleet occurs when snowflakes melt and freeze as they fall to Earth. Sleet looks like little ice pellets. Some places rarely have snow during the year, such as Florida. Invite your children to name other places where it rarely snows. It may be helpful to chart those places on a map or globe to notice that many of those places are close to the Equator.

Review with your children that it takes about a year for Earth to orbit the Sun. Remind your children that Earth is tilted on an axis. Using your classroom globe to illustrate the movement, show students how Earth’s axis and orbit around the Sun causes seasons to change during the year. In winter, our part of Earth is tilted away from the Sun and in summer, our part of Earth is tilted toward the Sun. Show your children that the Equator is an imaginary line that goes around the middle of Earth. The countries near the Equator do not tilt toward or away from the Sun that much throughout the year, so the weather is constantly warm and mostly sunny. The half of Earth above the Equator is called the northern hemisphere. The half of Earth below the Equator is called the southern hemisphere. When the northern hemisphere is tilted away from the Sun, the southern hemisphere is tilted toward the Sun. This means that when it is winter in the northern hemisphere, it is summer in the southern hemisphere. In the northern hemisphere, winter begins at the winter solstice (around December) and ends at the spring equinox (in February or March). In the southern hemisphere, winter is in June, July, and August.

Discuss how animals might survive cold, snowy winters. You may want to screen the Hibernation movie to learn more. During winter, many animals hibernate, or fall into a deep sleep, to survive the cold weather. Many people think bears hibernate, but they actually go into torpor. When the temperature goes up on warm days, bears wake up and feed. Then they sleep again when the weather gets colder. Other animals migrate, or move to another place for the winter. Many animals grow thick layers of fat or thick fur to help them survive colder weather. Encourage your children to come up with other ways animals survive the winter.

Learning about seasons and why they change help your children connect their own experiences to more abstract science concepts. In addition to screening the movies in the Weather unit, we recommend using plenty of maps and models of the solar system to help children understand Earth’s orbit, axis, and the changing seasons.

Winter Teacher Activities – Click Here!

Winter Family Activities – Click Here!

Winter Teacher Activities

Winter Wonderland

Tell the class you will be taking an imaginary vacation to a winter wonderland. Have students brainstorm the kind of weather they might experience and the animals they might see. Have students share their ideas with the class. Where might people and animals live in this place? How cold might it get? How might people stay warm? Encourage students to be creative but remind them that they must consider the weather first and foremost. Then have students go home and pack clothes for their imaginary vacation. What might they wear? How will they stay warm? Have students bring their bags to class and share items of clothing.

Orbit

If possible, take your students outside or in a gym where there is plenty of space. Assign students to partners. One partner can act as the Earth and one student can act as the Sun. Ask all the Suns to stand still. Ask the Earths to identify where their Equator is. Where is their northern hemisphere? Where is their southern hemisphere? Where is their axis? Then ask the Earths to try spinning around their Sun in a circle, or orbiting. After they have had a chance to orbit a few times, ask students to switch roles. You may also want to talk about how long this orbit takes, and discuss how the Earth tilts towards or away from the Sun.

Hemispheres

Remind your students that Earth is tilted at an angle. Have students make a model of the Earth by painting small balls or Styrofoam spheres. Students can create the Earth’s axis by poking a stick through the center of the ball and then they can model its orbit around the Sun. Have students draw a red line to show the Equator on their models, and paint the northern and southern hemispheres different colors. Then have them make a model of the Sun. As students model the orbit, they can see how during winter, one hemisphere tilts away from the Sun, while the other tilts toward the Sun.

December Travel Guide

Working in small groups, have groups pick three countries: one in the northern hemisphere, one near the Equator, and one in the southern hemisphere. You may also want to divide your class into three groups and assign them countries. Students can go to the library or use the Internet to research weather in the countries throughout the year. Then have students make a vacation travel guide for the month of December to these countries. What is the weather like in December in each of these places? Your students may want to draw pictures and cut out photographs from magazines as well as write a short description of each location. Have students share their travel guides with the whole class.

Winter Family Activities

Winter Weather

Have your child record the weather during the winter. You can purchase an inexpensive thermometer and have your child measure the temperature outdoors and keep track on a line graph or monthly calendar. Your child should also record weather conditions such as sun, wind, fog, rain, snow, or sleet. You can use a clear cup with a ruler to measure rainfall or put a yardstick in the ground to measure snowfall. At the end of a week, month, or year, look back at the weather for specific time periods and draw conclusions about the seasons. What was the coldest month? What was the hottest week? When was the coldest day in the winter? When did it rain the most?

Winter Animals

If possible, take a trip to a zoo with your child. Look at all the animals together and discuss how they might survive during in the winter. Remind your child that countries near the Equator stay warm all year. Would a monkey from the tropical rainforest survive in a place that snows? Why or why not? Encourage your children to think of ways each animal adapts to its environment. Why might a fox’s fur turn white during the winter? How might a raccoon stay warm during the winter? You may want to ask an expert or tour guide at the zoo for more information or have your child write his or her questions down so you can look it up at the library or on the Internet together.