Eight Winter Activities and Games for the Classroom

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Here is my curated collection of winter activities! I hope they will make this season merry and bright in your classroom. Whether you’re celebrating the magic of the winter solstice or indulging in holiday festivities, these engaging ideas are designed to bring joy, laughter, and a sprinkle of cheery warmth to your December, January, and February days.

1. Winter Trivia

This Canva presentation is the newest addition to my winter activities lineup. Fifteen trivia questions with bright, winter-colored graphics are featured. And after each question, the answer follows. You are welcome to edit the presentation template to customize it for your particular audience.

2. Vanishing Vowels

Vanishing Vowels: Winter Edition is also hot off the press. The fall version had thousands of views, so I thought a winter edition would be a good follow-up. Vanishing Vowels focuses on words related to a particular season. In this winter activity, 20 words are presented without any vowels. Students need to figure out what the word is! Each slide with missing vowels is immediately followed by the complete word and an image representation of the word.

Two ways to use this winter-themed activity:

• Use it as an individual or group exercise where students work together to decipher the words based on consonants. This encourages teamwork, builds class community, and also incorporates word recognition into the mix.
• Use it as a creative spelling activity where students add the appropriate vowels back in to spell the winter words. This activity enhances students’ word recognition skills and offers an opportunity to reinforce spelling proficiency in a fun and interactive manner. 

3. Winter Syllacrostic Puzzle

Are you looking for a fun word game to play as a winter activity? Give this 18-word syllacrostic puzzle a try! Here’s a quick overview if you aren’t familiar with syllacrostic puzzles. You’ll be given a box filled with various syllables. Then, you need to use those syllables to solve a list of Thanksgiving-related words. For each word, you’ll get three hints:

1. An associated phrase or word related to the solution
2. The number of syllables in the solution
3. The number of letters in the solution

Your task is to combine the given syllables into words that fit the length and syllable criteria.

4. Holidays Quiz Show

Flippity is a fantastic online generator of many tools. It has been around for several years and is created and maintained by one talented guy, Steve. I wish I could buy this guy a hot chocolate topped with many thanks. His user-friendly interface provides teachers with 28 customizable templates and games for the classroom. 

One of the tools is the Quiz Show (think Jeopardy). Check out the Holidays Quiz Show with these categories: symbols, food, action, clothing, and traditions. It’s a fantastic winter activity for the whole class! If you get tired of holiday trivia, check out the cheese category.

5. Winter Digital Breakout

If you follow my blogs, you know digital breakouts are my passion projects, so I made one to be a winter activity. The seasonal Winter Breakout is a beginner-level digital breakout. It has five locks: a word, five-color, four-number, five-direction, and eight-letter lock. It is the easiest of the two digital breakouts I’m sharing today. Now, you might be asking, how is it easier? 

1. There are only two sections available for clues.
2. The locks give an example.
3. I included only one obvious distractor. (The distractor for the WInter breakout is the little birds in the trees.)
4. There are no commas used in lock answers.
5. Enter colors and numbers in the order they appear in the breakout, not in alphabetical or number order. These are not mixed up in any way.

6. The Snowstorm Stumper Digital Breakout

The Snowstorm Stumper digital breakout has four locks: a six-color, five-direction, four-number, and four-letter. Whether you are new to my breakouts or a breakout fanatic, here are a couple of insider tips. I always try to include one or two hidden links for lock answers. I rarely use links to outside websites as I never know when the link might break or inappropriate content could pop up. I never mix up the order of colors or numbers. Enter them as you see them in the breakout, but letters might be scrambled. Enjoy this winter breakout activity!

Tips for the brand new breaker-outer!

• If your class has never solved a breakout, I would solve a breakout for them and model your thought process first.
• Then, try solving one as a whole-class activity.
• If that goes well, try it in small groups!
• Teach students to look at the locks on the Google Form and read through them first to get a heads-up on what they are looking for. (For example, if one of the locks is a four-color lock, look on the page for a group of four colors.) 
• Teach them to write down the combinations they have tried to keep from trying the same answer over and over.

7. Unscramble the Christmas Carols

Engage in the festive fun of unscrambling Christmas carols with this entertaining winter activity. I’ve given 18 classic Christmas songs new titles using similar words or synonyms. For example, “The Tiny Percussionist Lad” becomes my version of “The Little Drummer Boy.” You’ll see the synonym title immediately followed by its correct title. Explore the slide deck to test your carol knowledge or customize the activity for your classroom or as a staff icebreaker. Enjoy the merry task of unscrambling and spreading holiday cheer, whether solo or with a group!

8. Putting a New Spin on The Twelve Days of Christmas

In this new winter activity for 2023, leverage Emoji Kitchen to put a creative twist on The Twelve Days of Christmas. Use Emoji Kitchen to generate unique animals and characters for your personalized rendition of the song. Teachers, you can make a copy of the slide deck or use the Canva template to aid you in updating the twelve days of Christmas.

Hoping that one or more of these activities can be tailored for the snowy season or, if you are in Texas, at least the cooler part of the year. As always, teachers, if you need any assistance or the answers for the breakouts, please email me, Peggy, at preimers@tcea.org. Happy holidays!