Snowy Stories for the Winter Season

• Jessica Palmer
• Posted 11/23/20
• 0 comments

These snowy tales are fantastic for the entire winter season! December may feel like it’s all about Christmas, but many schools are moving away from the holiday to support their students that don’t celebrate. Or perhaps you need some activities during the cold January and February months. Whatever your reason may be, we’ve got you covered! Here are some of our favorite children’s books and some ideas for incorporating them into your music classroom library.

The Snowy Day

Ezra Jack Keats’ The Snowy Day is a classic for any music room. There are a variety of ways to use this text. As used in the GAMEPLAN Kindergarten curriculum, read the story, and invite students to pantomime the actions. Or add instruments for each action to create an interactive sound story. Want to teach this virtually? The Ezra Jack Keats Foundation has created an animated story with sound by Napoleon Maddox.

Winter

While Winter is designed to be a touch and feel book for babies, we love to use this in the preschool classroom! Float like a snowflake, ice skate on a frozen lake, howl like a wolf, or stand still as a tree. Use it as a group activity or allow students to work in small groups to create a movement for each page.

Tacky the Penguin

Set with a snowy backdrop, Tacky the Penguin tells the story of a bird with some very un-penguin-like antics. Need a ready to use lesson plan for this book? Check out Creative Bits with Children’s Lit! Sandy Lantz and Gretchen Wahlberg have created Orff arrangements and songs for the entire book for a truly engaging storytime or performance.

Snow Music

Lynne Rae Perkins’ Snow Music is perfect for a sound story. This beautifully illustrated tale invites the reader to imitate various sounds: the “jingle huff jingle huff” of a dog running through the snow, the engine of a car driving by, and the muffled sound of a radio. If you are teaching in the classroom, explore what instruments you can use to replicate the book’s sounds. Working virtually? Explore what sounds you can create with just your body as the instrument.

Walking in a Winter Wonderland

Follow a family through frosty fields and snow-covered woods in Walking in a Winter Wonderland. The sweet and cheerful illustrations pair so well with this classic song. Sing along, listen, and dance!

Snowmen at Night

Snowmen at Night poeticly asks and answers the question “What do snowmen do at night?” The rhyming text is perfect to create a tune for a singable story. Music Therapy KIDS have published a great article about using this book for music therapy, but their ideas are great for a classroom setting as well!

Winter is Here

For the first snow of the year, we love Winter is Here. This story explores all the aspects of winter with gentle language and expressive illustrations. Explore the soft, floating movement of snow as it falls from the sky, settles on the earth, and eventually melts to make way for spring. Listen to Winter from Vivaldi’s “The Four Seasons” or Debussy’s “The Snow is Dancing” during the story or as a movement activity afterwards.

What are your favorite winter themed books? Let us know in the comments below!