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.

Hey everybody, welcome back to the Naturally Teaching Elementary Science podcast. My name is Victoria Zablocki and I'm your host. So we're in the middle of the holiday season here in the United States, having just had Halloween, Thanksgiving's coming in a couple of weeks, and then the myriad of winter holidays is following close behind.

And if you're anything like me, you like to plan and you like to plan early. Some of us are not even thinking about classroom winter parties yet, while others have already got their to-do list started. So for those of you that fall into the latter group, I'm here to give you some ideas. For those of you who haven't started thinking about it yet, listen now and revisit this episode again in a few weeks when you're ready to start moving on things.

[1:44]

Real quick though, when it comes to winter party themes, many teachers use elements of Christmas or Hanukkah to inspire their parties. As most of us are aware, this eliminates some of our students as many people don't celebrate either of these holidays.

So I'm going to offer you a different option, consider this: celebrate the winter solstice.

So the winter solstice is a worldwide phenomenon that everyone has in common. We're approaching the winter solstice here in the Northern Hemisphere, while the Southern Hemisphere will experience it six months after us.

Either way, though, everyone on earth experiences the winter solstice at some point in the year. The fact that it's something we all have in common makes it a great theme for inclusivity and for providing your students a place-based opportunity.

[2:31]

Which brings me to today's science snippet. What exactly is the winter solstice and how does it happen? Having this background knowledge will empower you to be able to explain the phenomenon to your students as well as parents or administration that may have questions about it being used as a theme.

So the winter solstice is the first day of winter and like I said before, here in the Northern Hemisphere, it happens around December 20th or 21st each year. In the Southern Hemisphere, the winter solstice is near June 20th or 21st each year.

So how does the winter solstice happen? Some people believe that we experience winter when we're farther away from the sun in our orbit. However, if that were true, then both the Northern and Southern Hemisphere would experience winter at the same time.

Instead, the seasons are caused because of the Earth's tilt. The Earth isn't straight up and down on its axis. Instead, it's actually tilted approximately 23.5 degrees.

So if we use the Northern Hemisphere as an example, as the Earth goes around the sun, there's a point where the Northern Hemisphere is tilted the farthest it could be away from the sun. And the rays from the sun are at their most indirect or least extreme. This is the winter solstice.

So the lack of direct sunlight provides cooler temperatures and fewer hours of daylight, resulting in the winter season. If we stick with the Northern Hemisphere example, as the Earth continues its orbit around the sun, the tilt remains, and then the days are growing longer, and more direct sunlight is hitting the Northern Hemisphere. And at a certain point, the Northern Hemisphere is tilted neither towards the sun or away from the sun, resulting in mild temperatures and near equal hours of day and night.

And this is when we experience the vernal or spring equinox. As the Earth continues on its orbit around the sun, the Northern Hemisphere reaches a position where it's tilted as far as it can be toward the sun, and receives the most direct amount of sunlight and the most number of hours of daylight. This is the summer solstice.

As it continues, the Earth will come to a position again where the Northern Hemisphere is tilted neither towards the sun or away from the sun, providing again neither direct or indirect sunlight, and near equal hours of day and night. This one is the autumnal or fall equinox. Lastly, as the Earth finishes up its full revolution, the Earth comes back to the position where the Northern Hemisphere is tilted as far away from the sun as it can be, which again results in the most indirect amount of sunlight for the year, and the fewest hours of daylight, aka the winter solstice

The Southern Hemisphere follows the same pattern, but opposite times of the year. When the Northern Hemisphere is tilted away from the sun, experiencing winter, the Southern Hemisphere is tilted towards the sun, experiencing summer. This is how the Northern Hemisphere has its winter solstice in December, and the Southern Hemisphere has its winter solstice in June.

So with all of that scientific understanding behind us, this episode is going to be about celebrating the winter solstice with suggestions for outdoor activities, food, and crafts to take advantage of the season around you. But you could also use ideas from this episode for any themed winter party you choose.

And if you've listened to my other episodes, you all know that I think nature is a fantastic vehicle for your science learning. But it also makes an amazing space to hold your classroom celebrations. So think about it. You've probably Googled or used Pinterest to help you find activities, snacks, crafts, decorations, etc. for your different celebrations throughout the year. But nature offers you amazing opportunities naturally, meaning you won't need as many things to keep your kiddos occupied.

There's also amazing decorations already put in place by mother nature. The backdrop is perfect for each season, and is place-based, like I mentioned earlier. So if you're on board with the idea of celebrating the winter solstice outside, I've got some ideas for you in this episode. If you're thinking outside won't really work for you, listen anyway and you may hear some activities that spark your interest.

And if you're inspired by this episode and want more ideas, check out my article, “How Do You Celebrate the Winter Solstice with Elementary Students?” on naturallyteaching.com, which includes indoor and outdoor suggestions for activities, games, food, and crafts. So let's get into it.

[6:44]

No winter party would be complete without games, so we're going to start there. Nature provides you open space to have opportunities to get out all that party energy, and yelling and laughing loudly are more easily tolerated outside, which is helpful. So let's take advantage of it. Some games to consider using in your outdoor winter party are any form of tag game with a winter twist.

So something like Sharks and Minnows could become Snowy Owls and Voles. Elbow Tag becomes Snowflake Tag. Duck Duck Goose becomes Cardinal Cardinal Blue Jay.

And if you check out my article, “A Helpful Guide to Teaching the Season Transition to Winter”, it will give you directions for a game called Season Tag. This is a game that I developed to help students physically feel the difference between the seasons through tag. I also explain it more in detail in episode 17: “Six Fun Fall Activities Aligned with K-5 Next Generation Science Standards.”

And in that same episode, you could also hear about Migration Tag, which is a game that focuses on the seasonal movement of birds and insects for winter survival, which is also applicable for your winter-themed party.

Although not inherently a game, you could include sledding as part of your winter solstice celebration. Even though it's not a game, it is a gross motor activity, so I'm putting it in the game category because they use their whole body. But if you happen to have a hill at your school or the snow from your parking lot gets piled into a large hill that's appropriate for sledding, you could ask families to bring in sleds for celebrating the winter solstice, and then just make sure that they label the sleds with their family names so that they can be returned to the correct child. Even if you don't have a hill, you could have your students pull each other around in the sleds, which can be fun in itself.

You could also give your students extra recess. Again, not exactly a game, but students want more time to play on the playground, and in a way that's free play, which is game-like, and it gives them another opportunity to spend time in one of their favorite parts of your schoolyard.

[8:43]

So celebrating the winter solstice can come with low-key options as well, which can provide your students a breather from the craziness of the party. So not just games, but also these low-key chill activities.

So some suggestions for those could be crafts, which you could do a variety of different types of themed crafts. You could do a snow-inspired craft, such as filling spray bottles with liquid watercolor mixed with water, and then they could paint the snow, and then you could take pictures and send the pictures home with your students.

Or you could paint a snowstorm with puffy snow paint, which is made from equal parts school glue and shaving cream, which looks really fun, and you can do it with a popsicle stick, which is easy enough to manipulate with mittens on. You'll just want to make sure that you let it dry for like 24 hours or more, otherwise it can get really messy going home.

You could do evergreen-inspired crafts. So evergreen sensory bottles are really fun. You could use recycled water bottles, water, needles and cones gathered from the evergreens around your schools, and then put them all together with the water inside the bottles, and then your students have a sensory bottle. Just make sure to hot glue the tops before sending them home, because they can be opened on buses or in cars and make a giant mess.

Another evergreen-inspired craft could be doing pine cone weavings. So you could give your students pipe cleaners, ribbons or yarn, and then they could weave those through the scales of the pine cones, which can also be done with mittens on.

You could do some seed-inspired crafts. Winter is a time to be able to collect some seeds, because the plants have already pollinated, and they've sent out their seeds to be able to spread their species into a larger area.

So you could provide your students some cranberries, or chunks of apples, pears, fresh or dried berries or grapes, those sorts of things. And you could actually make bird feeder garland for your local birds. And they could either take them home, or they could hang them up in the school yard as a fun way to be able to celebrate the birds around you during the winter.

And if you're interested in doing the garland craft, I'll make sure to put a link in the show notes for a brief article that helps you out with food that's appropriate for birds and healthy for them, and then also suggestions for the twine that you use.

And then you could also make a school yard seed packet of seeds that your students collect from your green space and then they can take those seed packets home and in the spring, they could actually plant their own plants from the school yard seeds, which is kind of a fun way to integrate school into their home life.

Some more chill activity ideas would be sensory activities. So, you could bring in sandcastle toys or clean recyclables and let your students pack snow and make snow castles. So, instead of sand castles, you could make snow castles, which is really fun. It's a big hit with my kids during the wintertime.

You could catch snowflakes. So, to do this, you could prepare for the activity by wetting foam paint brushes, and then squeezing out most of the water so that they're just damp, and then put those outside your classroom door or in the faculty room freezer, and then that will make those foam pieces nice and cold. So, when the students catch the snowflakes, they don't end up melting right away, and then they can observe them up close. And the black foam makes a great backdrop to be able to see the different shapes of the snowflakes that they catch.

You could also look for animal tracks in the snow. So, you could mark an exploration space for your students and then let them walk around and look for animal tracks. And if you provide them track guides, they could actually try to identify who left the prints, which is a fun integration of literacy.

This would be a good station to have an adult volunteer for your party as the students may be inspired to leave the space to follow the tracks. And your volunteer can help remind them that even though it's super cool, they need to stay within sight of the teacher for safety reasons.

You could also create a bird food buffet. So, if you're in a location that's too warm for snow, a lot of these activities I talk about snow, you're likely in an overwintering site for migratory birds. So, if that's the case, you could provide your student small paper plates and cups, and have them create a “ bird food buffet” from nature. They could gather different things that birds would eat, and then they could pretend to run a restaurant for birds, which would be fun. They can spend time free playing with the scenario using very few provided materials, and mostly things from nature, and they will probably lose themselves in this play, and it can make for an amazing party activity.

Another chill opportunity would be to read some winter books. There's a lot of great picture books about winter out there, and your students could enjoy listening to one as they work through some of the crafts, or while they're eating their snacks. And if you want, you could check out my article, “16 Wonderful Children's Books About Winter for Elementary Teachers”, to find one that could connect to your curriculum. I am a huge proponent for using any and all opportunities to work towards your standards, and this could include your classroom celebrations. So, connecting literature is one of my favorite ways and such an easy integration to be able to work towards your standards without the kids even knowing that's what's happening.

You could provide them an engineering challenge. So for this one, you could have them try to walk on snow. So they could do it with their boots, figure out that they're gonna fall in, and then you could give them a variety of materials that they could use to try to create something that helps them walk on top of the snow. So you could provide clean recyclables like cardboard, washed styrofoam meat trays, large plastic pieces, and more alongside some masking tape. And then they could explore the power of surface area to be able to walk on the snow.

You could provide your students a nature scavenger hunt, like my 5 Senses of Winter Scavenger Hunts, where your students can challenge themselves to find as many things on the see, feel, hear, and touch scavenger hunts while they're outside.

[14:26]

And then, what's a winter party without food? So having food outside may not appeal to everyone, so you could always opt to have food inside and then take your winter solstice party outside.

But if you're cool with having food outside, some suggestions for keeping things easy could include having snacks that don't require your students to actually physically handle them with their mittens. So things on sticks like cookies or rice crispies on a lollipop stick are great.

You could also provide warm beverages, which would be appreciated with the cold. Options like warm apple cider or hot chocolate. Or you could even use the Taste Scavenger Hunt from my 5 Senses of Winter Scavenger Hunt to be able to guide your party food. So on this scavenger hunt, there's ideas for store-bought items that could be found in nature during the wintertime, including things like ice, tree bark, aka cinnamon, honey, leafy greens, which is a winter crop, bird food, so you could give your students Cheerios, raisins, or soy butter, water, insects, aka gummy insects, seeds, and grapes.

[15:32]

And the last thing to know is if you've decided to have your party outside, make sure to communicate that with your students' parents. This will help them in many ways. So first off, they will know what sorts of outdoor clothing to send with their student that day.

It's important that your kids are geared up so that they can have a positive experience. So if the parents know it will be outside, then hopefully they'll send what your students need in order to be outside for a prolonged period of time.

Also, if the parents are volunteering their time, they would also like to be dressed appropriately to be able to spend time outside. Again, you want a positive experience. So if they know up front that they will be outside and not inside, maybe they will have their ugly Christmas sweater underneath a coat so that way they can be outside and they can enjoy the station that you've had them start with your students.

If your parents are donating items for crafts, they can consider whether students will need different materials based on what gear they will be wearing. So for example, since it'll be cold, your students will have gloves or mittens on, and so large glue sticks are easier to manipulate with mittens than small glue sticks.

Also, if your parents are donating food for the party, you can suggest that the food be transportable, and parents will be more likely to follow that suggestion if they know their students will be moving around outside.

Also, make sure to share with your front office and administration if you'll be moving your party outdoors. It's good practice to have support from inside the building while you're outside with kiddos, just in case an emergency comes up or the front office needs to get a hold of you.

[17:06]

So in a nutshell, today we talked about celebrating the winter solstice instead of Christmas or Hanukkah as a way to be inclusive. We also talked about different activities and games that you could do outside, including any form of tag game with a winter twist, sledding, giving your students extra recess, crafts such as snow-inspired crafts, evergreen-inspired crafts, seed-inspired crafts, sensory activities such as building snow castles, catching snowflakes, looking for animal tracks, creating a bird food buffet play experience, reading some winter books, giving your students an engineering challenge, providing your students scavenger hunts, providing your students food that can be transportable outside, and then we also talked about how to communicate with your caregivers and also the front office and administration.

And don't forget, if you're looking for an engaging scavenger hunt, check out my 5 Senses of Winter Scavenger Hunts that include opportunities to see, hear, touch, smell, and taste winter nature. And if you're looking for suggestions for winter picture books to read, make sure you go and check out my article, “16 Wonderful Children's Books About Winter for Elementary Teachers.”

So thank you for taking time to listen today. I know you're busy, and I truly appreciate the time you take to tune in. If you have any questions, wonderings, or ways you're celebrating the winter solstice in your own classroom, get ahold of me on Instagram at naturally.teaching.

Or you can e-mail me at victoria@naturallyteaching.com. And don't forget to check out the show notes for this episode at naturallyteaching.com/episode26. 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.

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