Nature In Your Nurture

Books

🌿🌻Whose Prints? by Kari Ellen and Kim Smith
In this cute and interactive board book, explore the world of fresh fallen snow with illustrated prints and page cutouts to reveal what animal left them. This book includes deer, squirrels, rabbits, foxes, owls, and mice.

🌿🌻The Snowy Day by Ezra Jack Keats
A little boy named Peter is awed by the first snowfall of the year and bundles up in his red suit to explore the snowy world outside.

🌿🌻The Mitten by Jan Brett
In this classic board book, a grandmother fulfills a young boy’s request for a pair of snow-white mittens. Almost immediately, he loses one of them while playing in the snow. A series of progressively larger animals find the cozy mitten, stretching out the knit more and more until a sneeze sends the animals tumbling out and causes the mitten to sail through the air back to its owner.

🌿🌻Barn in Winter by Chambrae Griffith (illustrated by Taia Morley)
With wonderful rhythm and rhyme, this beautifully illustrated board book explores a farm during a winter storm. The snow-covered pens and pastures of a farm sit quiet and empty as the animals take shelter in the warm safety of the barn.

🌿🌻Little Snowflake by Suzanne Fossey (illustrated by Gina Maldonado)
This illustrated board book describes the “life cycle” of a snowflake, describing the frostier side of the water cycle through a first-person narrative. Sound and simple science explanations balance out everything having faces.

🌿 Over and Under the Snow by Kate Messner (illustrated by Christopher Silas Neal)
An illustrated fiction book in which a child and parent take a walk through the woods, exploring concepts of animals that are active in the winter and those that are inactive under the snow.

🌿Outside by Deirdre Gill
A little boy goes out to play in the snow. While his older brother stays indoors, the boy builds a snow castle and has an imaginative adventure until the sun goes down and it’s time to go back inside–but first his brother comes out to join him in the twilight snow.

🌿Owl Moon by Jane Yolen (illustrated by John Schoenherr)
In this illustrated story, a young child and her father go out silently into the winter night, listening and watching for owls. Their patience pays off and they eventually hear–and see– a great horned owl that flies close to them and calls back and forth with her father until it flies away and they walk quietly back home through the snow. Also available as a board book!

🌿So Much Snow by Kristen Schroeder (illustrated by Sarah Jacoby)
With cute soft illustrations and short rhythmic text, this book follows the accumulation of snow piling higher and higher through a week until the snow finally stops. As the sun emerges and warming weather melts it away over the next week, we notice the forest animals are slowly uncovered from tall moose down to tiny mouse… before the snow starts up again.

🌿Secrets of Winter by Carron Brown (illustrated by Georgina Tee)
This Shine-a-Light book describes wildlife in the winter, including animals that are active in the snow and animals that mostly sleep through the season.

🌿 Stranger in the Woods by Carl R. Sams and Jean Stoick
In this photo-illustrated story, a chatty group of animals in the woods is stirred up as they come across a mysterious stranger– a snowman! Stuffed with carrots and seeds, the animals help themselves to the goodies offered by the “stranger.” When the animals disperse, two watching children discuss coming back through the winter to offer food through the snowman.

Walking in a Winter Wonderland as sung by Peggy Lee, illustrated by Tim Hopgood
Illustrator Tim Hopgood has taken on a series of illustrated books based on songs that inspire beautiful imagery, such as Singing in the Rain, What a Wonderful World, and this winter classic.

We Want Snow: A Wintry Chant by Jamie A. Swanson (illustrated by Emily Boone)
The children in this book have been waiting and waiting for snow– and it finally arrives. This book is great for a snow unit, whether it’s been a white winter or not!

Red Sled by Lita Judge
This illustrated story has next to no text but depicts a group of animals picking up a red sled left against the outside of a house at the end of the day and taking it for a wild ride down the hill!

🌻Snowmen at Night by Caralyn Buehner (illustrated by Mark Buehner)
This illustrated board book asks why neat and tidy snowmen turn up slumped the next morning and proposes a fanciful explanation with excellent rhythm and rhyme.

Creative Art Opportunities

⛄️Circle sponge prints
⛄️Black circles and orange triangles on circular paper
⛄️Paint with textured white paint or whipped cream
⛄️Paint with frozen paint ice cubes
⛄️Use food coloring in a spray bottle to paint a snow sculpture (older children)
⛄️Collage with paper circles of different sizes and colors
⛄️Painting with large carrot
⛄️White chalk on black or dark paper

Hands On Experiences

❄️Build a snow man
❄️Make a “nest” in deep snow–form snow “eggs”
❄️Throw snowballs towards a target
❄️Build a circular snow fort
❄️Balance on a ridge of packed snow
❄️Slide or sled down a small hill or snow mound
❄️Play hide & seek among snow forts
❄️Shovel pathways through the snow to run along
❄️On a walk or hike, look for animal tracks left in the snow
🌿Put out feeders for hungry birds and squirrels
❄️Make snow bricks with rectangular bins
⛅️Explore snow with winter-active native animal toys in a sensory bin
If there’s no snow outside:
🌿Explore shaved or pulse-blended ice in a sensory table
⛅️Explore white rice, potato flakes, or cornstarch in a sensory table

Songs to Learn and Sing

“I’m a Little Snowflake” – Laurie Berkner (Tune: I’m a Little Teapot)

I’m a little snowflake, icy and round
I fall from the sky (and I don’t make a sound)
When it’s cold I’ll stay all day
When it’s warm I melt away

“A Chubby Little Snowman” (Tune: Baby Turtle)

A chubby little snowman had a carrot nose
Along came a bunny and what do you suppose?
That hungry little bunny, looking for his lunch
Ate the snowman’s nose, Nibble Nibble Crunch!

“I Love Snow” – Unknown (Tune: Three Blind Mice)

I love snow, I love snow
Soft, white snow; soft, white snow
It falls on the ground so soft and white
Sometimes it falls all through the night
Did you ever see such a beautiful sight
As soft white snow?

“Pretty Snowflakes” – Jean Warren (tune: London Bridge)

Pretty snowflakes falling down, falling down, falling down, falling down
Pretty snowflakes falling down all through the town.

Pretty snowflakes, on the street, on the grass, on my feet.
Pretty snowflakes falling down all through the town.

“Winter Snow” – Claudia Robin Gunn (excerpt)

Snowfall
Pitter patter scuffle
On the garden wall
Every sight is wonderful

With snow – Falling in the valley
Snow – Blanketing the fields
Snow – Cloaking all the hedges
Winter – Such a pretty scene
Oh winter – Life is but a dream
Winter snow

“Cherry Tree” – Margaret Wise Brown

There was a time when the cherries were red
That I lay on the grass and they fell on my head
The birds chirped and sang in the tree overhead
And I laughed in the grass when the cherries were red

But now my dear tree where the cherries were red
Is frozen and grey, the birds are all fled
I lie on the ground, snow falls on my head
And I dream of a time when the cherries were red

“Snowfall” – Margaret Wise Brown

In the soft, mysterious fall of the snow
The bell buoys ring, the whistles blow
While boats go slowly through the snow
Over the river to and fro

Slow, slow
In the soft mysterious fall of the snow
Light in the air and deep below
Through the trees all white with snow
The lights of evening softly glow

Slow, slow
In the soft mysterious fall of the snow
Walking in wonder the children go
Home from school their laughter low
Catching falling flakes of snow

“Winter Adventure” – Margaret Wise Brown

“Winter Wonderland” – Many versions now, but originally written by Richard Bernard Smith, 1934

Sleighbells ring, are you listening?
In the lane snow is glistening
A beautiful sight, we’re happy tonight
Walking in a winter wonderland

Gone away is the bluebird
Here to stay is a new bird
He sings a love song as we go along
Walking in a winter wonderland

In the meadow we can build a snowman
And pretend that he is Parson Brown
He’ll say, “Are you married?”
We’ll say, “No, man,
But you can do the job when you’re in town.”

Later on, we’ll conspire
As we dream by the fire
To face unafraid the plans that we made
Walking in a winter wonderland

“Sleigh Ride” – Winter song by Leroy Anderson, 1948

Just hear those sleigh bells jingling, ring-ting-tingling too
Come on it’s lovely weather for a sleigh ride together with you
Outside the snow is falling and friends are calling, “Yoo-hoo”
Come on it’s lovely weather for a sleigh ride together with you

Giddy-up, giddy-up, giddyup, Let’s go, Let’s look at the show,
We’re riding in a wonderland of snow.
Giddy-up, giddy-up, giddy-up, It’s grand, Just holding your hand,
We’re gliding along with a song of a wintry fairy land

Our cheeks are nice and rosy and comfy cozy are we
We’re snuggled up together like two birds of a feather would be
Let’s take that road before us and sing a chorus or two
Come on, it’s lovely weather for a sleigh ride together with you.

There’s a birthday party at the home of Farmer Gray
It’ll be the perfect ending a perfect day
We’ll be singing the songs we love to sing without a single stop
At the fireplace while we watch the chestnuts pop.
Pop! Pop! Pop!
There’s a happy feeling nothing in the world can buy
When they pass around the coffee and the pumpkin pie
It’ll nearly be like a picture print by Currier & Ives
These wonderful things are the things we remember all through our lives!

Just hear those sleigh bells jingling, ring-ting-tingling too
Come on it’s lovely weather for a sleigh ride together with you
Outside the snow is falling and friends are calling, “Yoo-hoo”
Come on it’s lovely weather for a sleigh ride together with you

“Jingle Bells” – Winer song by James Lord Pierpont, 1850

Dashing through the snow in a one-horse open sleigh
O’er the fields we go, laughing all the way
Bells on bob tails ring, making spirits bright
What fun it is to ride and sing a sleighing song tonight! Oh!

Refrain:
Jingle bells, jingle bells, jingle all the way.
Oh! what fun it is to ride in a one-horse open sleigh. Hey!
Jingle bells, jingle bells, jingle all the way;
Oh! what fun it is to ride in a one-horse open sleigh.

A day or two ago, I thought I’d take a ride
And soon Miss Fanny Bright was seated by my side
The horse was lean and lank, misfortune seemed his lot
He got into a drifted bank and then we got upsot!

[Refrain]
A day or two ago, the story I must tell
I went out on the snow, and on my back I fell
A gent was riding by in a one-horse open sleigh,
He laughed as there I sprawling lie, but quickly drove away

[Refrain]

Now the ground is white, go it while you’re young
Take the girls tonight, and sing this sleighing song
Just get a bob-tailed bay, two-forty as his speed
Hitch it to an open sleigh and–crack– you’ll take the lead!

[Refrain]

NIYN – Snow on Spotify
All playlists are works in progress and are actively curated when I have a unit in play or preparation, so new songs may appear and old songs may be removed if they don’t suit my designs.