Learning Year Round: Wintertime Homeschool Fun

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For those who live in the Northern Hemisphere, the winter season can bring drastic changes to their homeschool routine. If you are a homeschool family that spends a lot of time outdoors nature schooling, going on hikes and nature walks, or doing other outdoor activities, the winter may have you change up those routines. But learning year-round can continue to happen in fun and inventive ways. Wintertime homeschool fun can still happen outdoors. Or if your children prefer the indoors, there are new activities you can include. 

Learning Year-Round Outdoors 

Cold weather and snow do not need to keep you indoors. The wintertime opens up a new world of nature schooling. While many animals migrate or hibernate for the winter, there are quite a few that stay around for several reasons. If you or your neighbors have bird feeders out year-round, then you'll be sure to see birds and rodents around them, no matter the weather.  

Animals who stay active during the winter will provide your family with the opportunity to study how they adapt and change to the seasons. You can easily see their footprints in freshly fallen snow. Rabbits, squirrels, and other animals provide a great chance to observe animals from the inside comfort of your home. 

Outdoor physical activities can continue and change, too! Invite your children to help shovel snow and clean the walkways. Build snowmen, igloos, forts, and have snowball fights with your children. Ask your children to help take care of the outdoor animals. Teach them how to protect your home during the winter. These physical activities can bring together fun and education for your homeschool family.  

Indoor Wintertime Homeschool Fun 

In addition to sticking to your normal routine, you can add in new lessons, curriculum, resources, games, art projects, and more into your day. The new year is the perfect time to introduce these new activities. For example, we started a new social studies curriculum (courtesy of Timberdoodle) with our fifth-grader. It was a fun way to shack things up this winter.

To help with those fidgety moments, I also added some additional fidget toys. We introduced the Tangle™ to our children. This toy allows the user to twist and tangle it. They can keep their hands active while listening to read-alouds or thinking about math problems. 

Complementary Product Received

After visiting a table-top gaming convention, we also added in one new card game. There are two ways to play the game. The most basic way resembles the card game, War. Simply put: War of Beasts is a "twist on the classic card game war with magical beasts and enhancements." If you are playing the advanced version of the game, you want to collect enough gems to win the game. The cards are colorful and range from such mystical creatures as electric fire dragons and ethereal rats to phenomena modifiers like tornadoes, blizzards, and giant potions. 

What resources and activities do you add to your homeschool during the wintertime for fun?