Teaching science in elementary school is crucial for nurturing young minds. But as educators, finding the time and resources to create engaging lessons can be a challenge. That's where this podcast comes in.

Welcome to Naturally Teaching Elementary Science, the show dedicated to supporting elementary teachers in their quest to bring authentic and place-based science experiences to their classroom. I'm Victoria Zablocki, a certified elementary teacher turned outdoor educator. With over a decade of experience coaching teachers on effective science teaching methods, I'm passionate about making science accessible, understandable, and fun for educators and students alike.

Join me as we explore strategies for teaching science in elementary school with practical teaching tips, insightful interviews, picture book reviews, and more. Whether you've taught for a long time or just started your teaching journey, this podcast is your trusty resource for enhancing your science curriculum. So let's grow together.

All right, everybody, welcome back to the Naturally Teaching Elementary Science Podcast. My name is Victoria Zablocki and I'm your host. So today we're talking about winter.

Winter is a season of magic, mystery, and intrigue. So let's take advantage of this wonderful season to get your students engaged with your curriculum. So what can you do?

Gamify your curriculum. Students learn through play, which is a concept that has been backed by studies and one that I'm super excited to have a guest talk about next month. Anecdotally, this was one method of teaching that I saw some of the best results with the students that I worked with.

Between role playing games, obstacle courses, relay races, and more, I saw that wonderful aha face many times as students experience natural phenomena through play.

But before we get into the episode, I wanted to share a review from SarahWitt88 off Apple Podcasts. Sarah gave this podcast five stars and said, “This podcast is such an incredible resource for elementary teachers. It can be tricky to fit science in as much as you'd like throughout your school day, but Victoria makes it so much easier. She gives so many fun ideas for integrating science with literacy, and I especially love the emphasis on doing things outdoors. Victoria's enthusiasm for science is contagious and leaves me feeling inspired when the episode is over.

It's clear that she has a background in education because the episodes are well thought out and easy to follow. The icing on top is that the audio quality is great too. 10 out of 10, recommend.”

Thank you so much, Sarah, for your kind words. I appreciate your comments, and I'm glad to hear that you're hearing unique and helpful ideas for the classroom. If you've been listening and have some thoughts about this podcast, consider taking a few minutes to leave a review.

Your suggestions will help me make this podcast the best resource it can be for elementary teachers and homeschool coordinators alike.

[2:49]

So since this episode is all about winter, I thought I'd share a quick nature note about what you can find outside this time of year. If you listened to episode 26: Celebrating the Winter Solstice with An Outdoor Party for Your Elementary Students, then you heard the science snippet about how the winter solstice comes to be.

If you haven't, you can pop back over and check it out. But put simply, when your hemisphere experiences the winter solstice, the Earth is tilted on its axis and your hemisphere is tilted away from the sun, meaning you're receiving the least amount of direct rays that you will for the entire year. This results in lower temperatures and in many regions, snow.

Because of these indirect rays and lower temperatures, many plants and animals spend the season dormant or in a sleep-like state. This is a season of scarcity and many organisms survive it by conserving their energy and going into that sleeping state. So what can you find if a bunch of things are sleeping?

As far as weather goes, now is a great time to look for the different states of water, since we have the temperatures necessary to freeze liquid water into solid. You can also find a variety of cloud types. And as far as plants, now is a great time to look for seeds.

The flowers spent the summer and fall attracting pollinators, and now the seeds are left behind. You can also find trees that look dead, but if you examine the ends of their branches carefully, you can find next year's leaves bundled up in buds. And if you're lucky to have witch hazel close by, you may even find their late flowers blooming like little yellow sea stars on a bush.

As far as animals, you may not see many animals out and about, but there will be lots of clues that there are still some animals awake. Look for animal tracks in the snow, buds nipped off branches, indentations in the snow where animals have slept, seed pods ripped open, holes in the snow from digging squirrels, and more. And if you're lucky, you may even find owl pellets in the snow under trees.

Some animals that you'll likely see are birds. Since many remain active in the winter, if you have a bird feeding station at your school, you'll probably see a lot of these feathery creatures as they come snack on the easy food in your feeders. Okay, so in this episode, I'm going to describe fun winter activities for grades K through 5.

For each activity, I'll share the Next Generation Science Standard that inspired that activity, as well as the winter seasonal phenomenon that the activity helps explain. And make sure that you listen through to the end of the episode, because even though I've paired these activities to particular standards, you may find yourself inspired to use a similar concept for your curriculum, or even use the same activity for a different grade. Also, if you're new to taking your students outside for learning, check out episode 6: 5 Outdoor Education Safety Tips for Teaching Outside, for suggestions to make teaching outside easier. Now let's get into these fun winter activities.

[5:32]

So for kindergarten, the Next Generation Science Standard that I pulled was K-PS2-1: plan and conduct an investigation to compare the effects of different strengths or different directions of pushes and pulls on the motion of an object. So how does this relate to winter?

So it doesn't explicitly connect to winter, but working with pushes and pulls is fun in the snow. So we're using snow to enhance these activities. And if we're being completely honest, teaching pushes and pulls in the classroom can be pretty dull.

But if you do it in the winter using the snow, you've just created a unit that will stick with your students. Everything is better in the snow. Plus, snow reduces the amount of friction on objects, so your students will be able to have experiences on a much larger scale than if they were trying to push and pull on blacktop or carpet.

So an example of a lesson you could conduct that would include pushes and pulls would be exploration stations outside. For one station, you could provide a couple of sleds with heavy objects to move from a start line to a finish line. So these “heavy things” could simply be logs or even a fellow student.

Have them try pushing and pulling to determine which method is easier and takes less work. For another station, if the snow is packy, you could have them make a large snowball. You could even challenge them to make it as big as themselves.

Was it easier to push or pull the snow to make a huge snowball? Another station could be using small shovels to move snow. Is it easier to push the shovel or pull the shovel to move the snow?

Another station you could consider would be throwing snowballs at targets. And this one may make you tense up as soon as you hear me say it, but just hear me out. The other stations that I've mentioned so far have a clear force that's easier.

For sleds, it's easier to pull. For rolling big snowballs, it's easier to push. And for shoveling, it's easier to push.

Throwing snowballs actually involves both a pull and then a push. This will not only be your student's favorite station by far, but it will also show them that sometimes you include both a push and a pull to accomplish a goal. So how would I set up this station for success?

I would put out boxes with targets on them, or I'd put this station close to trees and use the trees as the targets. I would then put down a throwing line that the students can't cross. And then I would walk through every station, showing the class the goal of each station, and sharing with them the expectations that I have for each station.

I would save the snowball throwing station for last and share the goal with them. They'll be throwing snowballs at the targets and deciding if they use a push or a pull. And then I would have them help me decide on the rules to use for this station.

This puts the responsibility on them to decide how to keep everyone safe. And if anyone veers from the agreed upon safety rules, I can remind them that they're the ones who said, you can only throw snowballs at targets, not each other, or that they all have to remain on one side of the line so no one gets hit, etc. To help make sure that the students follow these directions, I personally would position myself closest to this station, and I would be selective of which students started at that station, making sure to choose responsible students that would be good examples for the rest of the class.

If you have any tried and true activities for pushes and pulls that you use inside, you could also consider how you could turn those into stations in the snow.

[8:55]

For first grade, the Next Generation Science Standard that I pulled was 1-PS4-2: make observations to construct an evidence-based account that objects in darkness can be seen only when illuminated. So how does this relate to winter?

Many locations in the United States get the opportunity to have snow. Snow is white, and light bounces off it, which makes nature look brighter in the darkness. Winter is also a time when we experience the most hours of night, and you may experience some time in the dark during your school day.

So at the beginning of the school day, for this activity, gather together in your classroom and turn off all the lights and block any windows that could let light in. Have your students remain seated during this time as a safety measure, since they likely won't be able to see anything, and they could end up falling if they walk around. Have them describe what they see in the darkness.

If you can get it dark enough in your classroom, they probably won't be able to see much of anything. To help them experience just how important light is to the process of seeing, take out a random object they've never seen you hold before, like a stuffed animal, and then tell them that you're holding an object in your hand, and you're looking for a volunteer to describe what you're holding. Since you won't be able to see their hands raised in the dark, have your students say their name if they'd like to volunteer the information.

After each volunteer has shared, turn the lights back on and reveal the object. Have them give some guesses as to why they couldn't see the object when the lights were off. And then once they've experienced looking for an object in the dark inside, take an early morning stroll in the relative darkness outside when there's snow on the ground.

Have your students walk next to a partner so that your line is two wide, and then have them share their observations with their partner as they walk. They're looking for what they can see in the dark outside. When your walk is completed, stop outside or head back inside to have a class discussion about what they noticed.

Even though it was dark outside, could they still see things in nature? Why did they think that's the case? The sun wasn't up, but they were still able to see the shapes of trees, animals in bushes and more.

Somebody will probably bring up the fact that the snow looked like it was glowing, and now is the time to talk about different colors and how they can make light bounce back to your eye, allowing you to see things. This is a fun and engaging way to talk about light and how it interacts with your eyes using winter.

[11:09]

The second grade Next Generation Science Standard that I pulled is 2-ESS2-3: Obtain information to identify where water is found on Earth and that it can be solid or liquid. How does this relate to winter? Winter is a great time to naturally find water in different states, sometimes even in three different states on the same day.

Snow is also a puzzling phenomenon for students. Is it a solid or is it a liquid? For this concept, mapping your school yard would be a great exercise.

Give your students a clipboard, a paper, a pencil, and maybe also bring out colored pencils or crayons. Have everyone sit together in one spot in your school yard and talk to them about mapping the space. Work together to add notable landmarks like the building, the playground, a line of trees, etc. which you can then model using a large paper or poster board in front of the class.

Once everyone has their bearings and their landmarks, share with them their exploration space using natural boundaries, like a fence line, sidewalks, a tree line, and so forth. Then give them 10 minutes or so to move around their exploration space, drawing in examples of liquid water and snow that they see in their school yard.

If they want to add color using the colored pencils or crayons, have them run out with their pencils to draw in the shapes of the water first and then come back to a central meeting location to use the colors. This will help you keep your coloring utensil stock intact. Otherwise, you risk losing the coloring utensils in the snow.

It's a lot easier for your students to hold one clipboard and one pencil instead of one clipboard, one pencil and crayons while also wearing mittens or gloves. If they don't want to add color, they should label their drawings with what kind of water they're seeing. After they've had their 10 minutes to map the school yard, call everyone back with your attention getter and then have them share what kinds of water they found by adding it to the class map that you use to model adding landmarks.

They could come up and draw it on the map or use their fingers to trace what they found and then you add it to the class map. Continue asking for volunteers until you've gotten as much data as you can added to the class map. Keep these maps and do this again in the spring after the snow has melted to see if there are any differences in where water is located and in what state.

[13:17]

The Next Generation Science Standard that I pulled for third grade is 3-LS2-1: Construct an argument that some animals form groups that help members survive. So how does this relate to winter?

Some animals gather together for winter survival. Some examples of this are snakes that gather together in holes in the ground called hibernacula. Honeybees gathering in their hives, shivering for warmth and flying squirrels that gather together in holes in trees to share body heat.

So for this activity, you're going to play a Simon Says-like game. To play this game, you're going to lay down two ropes to be end lines on either side of your playing field.

These lines should be separated by 20 feet or so, not so close that your students can run from one to the other super quick, but also not so far that it takes them a long time to get from one end to the other. Let your students know that they're going to act like animals that use grouping together in the winter for survival during the game. Then you're going to share with them the commands of this game.

If you yell “fall”, the students run to a certain end line. If you yell “spring”, they'll run to the other end line. So your play space is going to act like a timeline.

Fall on one side, winter in the middle, and spring on the other side. The animals your students are pretending to be are solitary during the fall and spring, but are communal in the winter, except for the honeybees, they're communal year round. So when you yell one of the solitary seasons, they run by themselves to that season.

So if you yell “spring”, they run to the spring rope. If you yell “fall”, they run to the fall rope. If you yell “dray”, your students group together in the middle of the play area in groups of three flying squirrels.

The flying squirrels that communally meet in the winter are called a dray. If you yell “hibernacula”, your students group together in the middle of the play area in groups of four snakes. If you yell “winter cluster”, the entire class comes together to make a shivering cluster of honeybees in the middle of the play area.

You can use the previous commands for active learning, and you don't have to include elimination if you don't want. However, if you'd like to add the element of elimination, you can add a few modifications. If you yell “spring” and they run to fall, they're eliminated.

If you yell “dray” or “hibernacula”, if some of your students are left out because your class numbers don't work out to have equal numbers of three or four groups, then anyone remaining is eliminated. If you yell “predator coming” while the students are grouped together, either as dray, hibernacula, or winter cluster, they have to remain still while you walk around and try to get them to move with your voice only. So you can talk to them, you can stand close to them, but you can't touch them.

And if they move, they're eliminated. After you've walked around for a little bit, yell “all clear” to let your animals know they can relax and await the next command and they won't be eliminated.

If you do choose to eliminate students, make sure to restart the game though within like five to maybe like eight minutes or so. This game can go for a long time if you try to eliminate from a group of like 30 kids, down to just one or two students. And the eliminated students could get bored and tune out the learning.

Once you've covered the commands, have everyone start in the middle in the winter season, and you yell out commands for a practice round without elimination. So yell a season, yell “spring”, then yell “fall” so they can practice running from spring to fall, or from fall to spring. Then throw in a “dray” so they can practice coming together in a group of three.

Then yell “spring” or “fall”. Then a “hibernacula,” come together as a group of four. Then a season.

Then a “winter cluster” where they come together as a class. Then a “predator is coming” with an “all clear” once you've walked around. Once they seem to have the commands down, play it again, but add elimination if you'd like. Yell the commands out one by one, getting the students to run all over the place. They'll love the movement and they'll also giggle as they go.

[17:19]

The Next Generation Science Standard that I pulled for 4th grade is 4-ESS2-1: Make observations and or measurements to provide evidence of the effects of weathering or the rate of erosion by water, ice, wind or vegetation. So how does this relate to winter? We're going back to the snow again.

Snow is a fantastic medium to model earth science concepts, including erosion. So for this activity, it's a little more material heavy, but it's totally worth it. So to prepare for this activity, you're going to bring in a large bucket and fill it with water at the school.

Gather some recyclables from home or from the school that your students can use to collect water from the bucket and then dump on to their snow models. You can actually use those same recyclables to test ice erosion, which I'll explain in just a second, after you've modeled the other types of erosion that we'll talk about.

So when you're ready for the lesson, have your students use snow to build mountains or hills, and then blow on them to see the snow whisked away, and that will represent wind erosion.

Bring out that bucket we talked about of water and have them dump a little bit of water on top of their hills and watch the snow move away. That represents water erosion. Have your students use those recyclables surrounded by snow, and then let them freeze overnight to be able to see how the expansion in the ice moved the snow around the recyclable, which can represent ice erosion.

And then also have your students drop snowballs on their hill to see the effects of gravity erosion on their “sediment”. You could do this activity altogether as a class where each child tries each erosion model at the same time, or you could set this up as centers where they get to try for a certain amount of time and then rotate to the next location. Either way, this is a great illustration of erosion for your students to experience firsthand.

[19:11]

The Next Generation Science Standard that I pulled for 5th grade is 5-ESS2-1: Develop a model using an example to describe ways the geosphere, biosphere, hydrosphere, and or atmosphere interact. So how does this relate to winter?

All of the spheres work together to make snow days, a treasured event for many elementary students. So to start this activity off, I suggest reading aloud the book Rivers of Sunlight: How the Sun Moves Water Around the Earth by Molly Bing and Penny Chisel. This book illustrates the interactivity of the biosphere, hydrosphere, geosphere, and atmosphere in the context of the water cycle powered by the sun.

And it'll provide your students a model of how those spheres work together to create snow for their snow days. So for your fun winter activity, you put together an obstacle course where your students get to pretend to be a drop of water moving through the water cycle by following the steps from the book. So to prepare for this activity, put down two long ropes that will indicate your sidelines, or you could position your obstacle course to take place inside of natural boundaries, like sidewalks.

If you're in a part of the world that gets snow, I would suggest using colored ropes or cones to show the sidelines, since white ropes will probably blend in with the snow. You'll also want to designate the starting and ending lines with ropes or cones, so the students know where they're aiming to begin and end their cycle. So in the story, the water begins in the ocean, because that's where most of the water on Earth can be found.

So have your starting zone represent the ocean, and that “zone” can be a wide section to represent the vastness of the ocean. And when your students are in that zone, they're gonna pretend to swim from the start line to the end of that zone, which you could again designate by ropes or cones. Next in the book, the water evaporates into the atmosphere.

So once your students reach the end of the ocean zone, have them do ten jumping jacks to get the energy they need to evaporate. The next zone is the atmosphere, and the water droplet in the book finds pieces of dust, condenses together with other water droplets, and then precipitates back to Earth. So for this zone, have your students form a group of three with their backs all together, and their arms pointing out from their body to create a six-sided snowflake.

If they don't have three students, they have to wait in that zone for another student to drop in and complete their snowflake. Once their snowflake is complete, they can break apart and snow on to the land, which will be the next zone. Or if they want, they could actually snow back into the ocean zone and start the obstacle course all over again.

Just make sure that they go outside the boundaries and then back up to the ocean to enter the obstacle course again. If they choose to enter the land zone, which is the next zone down, have them “float” down so they can do some sort of floaty dance thing, and then lay down on the ground and “melt”. So they can lay there for three to five seconds.

Once they've melted, they've entered the aquifer zone and have them jump from poly spot to poly spot, or you could use paper plates or something else to designate spots. And this is like percolating through the layers of rock to reach the bottom of the aquifer. Then in the book, once the water droplet moves through the aquifer, it gets sucked up into plants.

So you could provide them with a fabric tunnel to crawl through or a few cardboard boxes set up on their ends for them to crawl through. This is like being sucked up by their roots. Then after they've made it through the plants, they've reached the end line and they evaporate back into the atmosphere, or at least that's what happened in the book.

After you've set up the obstacle course, you want to bring your students outside and show them what they do in each zone. Bonus points if you run through the obstacle course like you're a fifth grader, they absolutely love it. Once you reach the end of the obstacle course, you'll have to share with them if they're done or if they go outside the boundaries and make their way back to the atmosphere zone and wait for a group of three to create a snowflake and precipitate again.

I would suggest having your students complete at least two rounds so they can feel the cyclical nature of the water cycle. Once they've gotten their directions, have them complete the water cycle however many number of times you'd like or for a certain length of time. After your time is up, spend some time talking about their experiences.

Did anyone stay in the atmosphere for a long time waiting for more water droplets to come and complete their snowflake? Was there a backup at the plants as they waited for their turn to get sucked up by the roots of the plants? Where did they move through the quickest?

Make sure to touch briefly on which zone was which sphere so that they can see that the geosphere, biosphere, hydrosphere, and atmosphere all work together to make their journey possible.

[23:56]

All right, so in a nutshell, today we talked about six fun winter activities that are aligned with the K-5 Next Generation Science Standards. For kindergarten, we talked about exploration stations for pushes and pulls using the snow.

For first grade, we talked about making observations in the dark and then taking a dark walk outside. For second grade, we talked about mapping your schoolyard looking for examples of snow and liquid water. For third grade, we talked about a Simon Says-like game, where your students get to practice being animals that are solitary during fall and spring, and then communal during the winter time.

For fourth grade, we talked about erosion stations. For fifth grade, we talked about an obstacle course where they were moving through the water cycle. So thank you for taking time to listen today.

And don't forget, if you have a few minutes and you've been enjoying this podcast, please leave a review. Your thoughts help me make this podcast better and help other educators decide if it's a good fit for them. So thanks again for taking time to listen today.

I know you're super busy and I truly appreciate the time you take to tune in. If you have any questions, wonderings, or fun winter activities that you use, get a hold of me on Instagram at Naturally.Teaching, or you can email me at victoria@naturallyteaching.com. And don't forget to check out the show notes for this episode at naturallyteaching.com/episode32, where I'll have links for those other episodes that I mentioned.

Thanks again for joining me today and until next time, keep exploring, keep learning, and keep Naturally Teaching.

Thank you so much for tuning in to today's episode of the Naturally Teaching Elementary Science podcast. I hope you found it informative, inspiring, and full of actionable insights to enhance your science teaching journey. Connect with me on social media for more updates, science tidbits, and additional resources.

You can find me on Instagram and Facebook at Naturally.Teaching. Let's continue the conversation and share our passion for elementary science education together. Don't forget to visit my website at naturallyteaching.com for all the show notes from today's episode.

If you enjoyed today's episode, please consider leaving a review on your favorite podcast platform. Your feedback helps me improve and reach more educators just like you. Thank you again for listening, and until next time, keep exploring, keep learning, and keep naturally teaching.