Winter in Warm Places A winter unit study Ages 4–7
The Winter Sky
$5.99 · One-time purchase
Dark comes before bedtime in winter. We go outside after supper, learn to find Orion and the Big Dipper, and watch them move while we stand still.
Page four
The four books
Read them aloud in any order, and read a favorite twice. If your library doesn’t have one of these, another good book on the same subject works just as well.
- Owl Moon — Jane Yolen
- The Big Dipper — Franklyn M. Branley
- Find the Constellations — H. A. Rey
- Papa, Please Get the Moon for Me — Eric Carle
The books aren’t included. Most libraries have them.
Page six
The science lesson
The stars aren’t moving across the sky. We are.
The earth spins all the way around once a day, and it carries us with it. That’s why the stars seem to rise in the east and set in the west, just like the sun.
It starts with what the grown-up needs to know, in plain words. Then there’s something to try together at the table, and one question to ask afterward.
“If we’re the ones moving, why does it look like the stars are moving?”
And the rest of the week
- The poems
- One short poem to learn by heart (Robert Louis Stevenson) and one to enjoy hearing (Jane Taylor).
- The activity
- Line Orion up with something. The sky moves too slowly to see while you watch.
- The craft
- A constellation tube. Looking through the tube is good practice for finding the shape in the real sky.
- Math
- Two pages: “Counting the stars” and “The clock in the sky.”
- The copywork page
- Three sizes to choose from, from the single word “star” up to “Thousands of millions of stars.” Practice makes progress.
- Outside
- A page for spending some time outside observing nature, one look a day, with room for a word, a number, or a tiny drawing.
- A devotion, five days
- A verse, a sentence, and a “Thank you God for ___,” line each day. Psalm 147:4 · Job 9:9 · Genesis 1:16 · Psalm 8:3-4 · Psalm 19:1. The verse to learn this week is Psalm 19:1.
- Cocoa for stargazing
- Made on the stove and carried outside in warm mugs. It makes the waiting in the dark more fun.
- Coloring pages
- Two simple, hand-drawn pages to color.
- What you will need
- Four books from the library, a printer, and things most homes already have: warm coats and a blanket, a flashlight and red paper, a hardback book and pencil, a brick to mark your spot, a cardboard tube, black paper, a pin, and tape, and cocoa ingredients.
Take the Winter Sky unit.
One purchase for the whole unit as a print-ready PDF. No account and no login. Your download is ready as soon as you check out, and it’s yours to print as often as you like for the children in your own house.
Part of a set of six
Winter in Warm Places
$24 · $35.94 bought separately
The Winter Sky is one of six units for mild, wet winters. The set adds The Rains, Frost and Dew, The Birds That Came South, The Cold Snap, and The Winter Harvest, one unit for each week of winter. You get six separate PDFs.
Here it is.
All five days of Apples, yours to print. A copy is on its way to your inbox as well — check the spam folder if it isn’t there in a few minutes.
Start with Monday: cut an apple across the middle instead of down through the stem, and look for the star.