Loads of Winter Mitten Fun!

We stumbled across this awesome post from Mrs. Carroll at The First Grade Parade and thought there were some great activities that could be introduced to your kinders {or tailored for your kiddos} this winter! All the activities are inspired by Jan Brett's The Mitten! Here's a look at two of our favorite exercises...

Mitten Probability {pictured above left}

Mrs. Carroll created large mitten 'envelopes', placing character cards {from The Mitten, of course} into each. This was originally a lesson on probability, but for your kinders, you could turn it into a graphing exercise. Simply have your kiddos reach into the the mitten, pull out a character card, and record the selection on the graph. Have them return the card to the mitten, shake it up, and repeat the process ten times {or another number you decide}. After their graph is complete, help them interpret the data - comparing the columns using most, least, more than, less than, equal to, etc.

A "Mitten"ful of Words {pictured above right}

Mrs. Carroll stuffed inexpensive mittens with letter tiles and word building mats, each mat featuring a different focus blend. Students were invited to create unique words using the mats and tiles, recording their created words on a fun mitten themed worksheet. For your kinders, you might adapt the exercise to feature different word families. You could also stuff the mittens with various clip art images and have students determine which have the same beginning letter sound as the mitten on their recording sheet.

These are just two of the awesome activities we found at The First Grade Parade - be sure to head on over there for some winter inspiration!