Materials
- Suitcase Clothing
- Clothesline Clothespins
- Two signs: "Cold Weather" and "Warm Weather"
What to do
1. In advance, pack a suitcase with clothing for different types of weather.
2. Hang two clotheslines at the children's level. Mark one with the "Cold Weather" sign and the other with the "Warm Weather" sign.
3. Talk about the weather and what people wear when it is hot, cold, etc. If possible, read a short poem or sing a song about the weather.
4. Show the suitcase to the children and explain that it contains different kinds of clothing.
5. Invite the children to come up (one at a time) and pick something from the suitcase. The child decides whether the article is something a person would wear in cold or warm weather and hangs it on the appropriate clothesline.
6. When all the items have been hung, ask the children to pick one item and suggest an activity where it might be used (e.g., bathing suit for swimming).
More to do
- Dramatic play: Make the clothes available for dress-up.
- Game: Play weather charades. Have children act out weather words like breezy, bright, cold, wet, rainy, hot, etc., as classmates try to guess them.
- Snack: Make Crunchy Snowballs. Melt 1/4 cup (60 ml) butter and 1 package of marshmallows in the microwave. Add 6 cups (1.5 L) rice cereal, 1 cup (250 ml) at a time, stirring constantly. Shape into snowballs. (Buttered hands help.) Shake balls in a bag with powered sugar.
-Vicki Whitehead, Ft. Worth, TX
