The Arctic Preschool Unit Theme
My preschooler has been fascinated by the arctic region from the time she was a toddler. She absolutely loved the animals early on, and her love for learning about the Arctic has just grown from there. So this winter, I created for her a Montessori-friendly arctic preschool themed unit. Holistic, hands-on, and low-prep, this preschool unit helps build on key skills such as phonetic awareness and learning about animals, while also introducing geography concepts and exploring arctic cultures.
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Arctic Themed Language Activities
Arctic Animals Sandpaper Letters
If you are just starting out with phonics, sandpaper letters can be a great activity for preschoolers. Using either pictures of arctic animals (you can find the arctic animal language cards I created here), or Toob figurines, lay out a few sandpaper letters and a few arctic animals and have your child match the sound of the beginning letter to the correct animal.
For more of a challenge, have them match the animals to the ending sound or the even the middle sound.
I purchased these sandpaper letters and they’ve held up great. And if you’re not ready to commit to a set of sandpaper letters yet, you could easily make your own snow themed ones by writing the letter on an index card, tracing it with glue, and adding glitter to the top for a textured feel.
Arctic Animals Language Cards
I love including language cards in my units. It’s a great way to help reinforce phonetic awareness without phonics feeling repetitive and dull.
I created these arctic animal language cards that are available here. (Plus, I added a sorting activity to the end of them to use in the science activity in this unit theme.)
You can use these in so many ways. Since my daughter was pretty familiar with the idea of phonics by this point, I used these to separate the words from the pictures, and then I encouraged her to sound out the words to match them to the correct animals.
You can see below the order we did this in. First we matched sounds to the letter. Then my daughter added the name to the animal based on the starting letter. I only introduced three at a time to keep it manageable, but adding more would make it more challenging. I also deliberately chose to do “P” and “B” together as those are commonly confused letters.
However, if you’re looking for more ways to use three-part language cards, I recommend checking out this video.
Arts and Crafts
Cotton Ball Polar Bear
A classic and certainly not original, but it was such a fun morning that I couldn’t leave it out. Print out a polar bear template, glue it onto some paper, and then let your preschooler glue cotton balls to it.
I’ll be honest- we did this more for my toddler, but my preschooler still loved doing this craft. And I loved that she got some great cutting practice from cutting out the template.
To make clean up easy, I put glue in a bowl and gave my girls q-tips to use as brushes.
Clay Igloo
Also simple enough- grab some air dry clay or salt dough (I love Crayola’s clay) and have your preschooler sculpt an igloo out of it.
To make it fancier, add some glitter to the top or glue on some sparkly pom poms to make it look snowy.
And if you really want to go above and beyond, add in some animal figurines and some white felt to make a whole arctic scene.
Paint the Northern Lights
My daughter has always been fascinated by the northern lights (except for the time that we got her out of bed to see them and they disappeared by the time we got outside- she was pretty cranky with us that night).
So for this, I simply set her up with some pastels and paper, showed her a picture of the northern lights again, and let her creativity take over.
But if your kid wants more guidance and ideas to make it even better, check out this art lesson for kids here:
Arctic Themed Science Activity
Sorting Arctic Animals
Using the same arctic animal cards linked above or the Toob figurines, have your child sort the animals based on if the animal lives on land, in the water, or both. If you use the arctic animal cards that I created, I included a Venn diagram at the end to help them sort the cards or figurines into the correct categories.
Practical Life Skills/Fine Motor Skills
“Rescuing” Arctic Animals
This might have been my favorite activity in this unit. I got some of the Safari LTD Good Luck Minis with incredibly small arctic animals. (And my preschooler went crazy over how tiny and cute they were.) Then we placed them in an ice cube tray and set them outside to freeze
Then I placed the ice cube tray on a large baking sheet and gave her a bowl of water and an eye dropper. She practiced using the eye dropper to drip the water over the ice cubes and eventually get them to melt to “rescue” the little animals.
It was adorable, but along the way she was also practicing fine motor skills and realizing that anything warmer than ice will help melt the ice. This was also a great activity that kept both of my girls’ attention during a week where we had been iced in for days.
.(Oh and just a note on these particular Minis- they include penguins for unknown reasons. So either set those aside or use them as a sorting activity between animals of the arctic and Antarctica.)
Arctic Geography and Culture
Placing Arctic Animals on a Large Map
This is a great hands-on way to give kids a solid concept of where the arctic region is. Simply lay out a large map (I love this huge map quilt that I have) and then have your child place arctic animal figurines in the arctic circle.
Not only are they learning where the arctic circle is, but they’re also learning how maps represent where water is and where land is. Encourage them to keep it accurate of having ocean animals in the water and land animals on land. (This will also reinforce the sorting that they did previously.)
Create a Norwegian Cityscape
I love the bright colors of Norwegian cities. Since my daughter loves to paint and color with pastels, I found her a printable Norwegian coloring sheet here.
You cold also save toilet paper rolls or cardboard boxes and then paint or glue construction paper to them to make a 3D cityscape.
Learning About Arctic Cultures
There are eight countries within the Arctic Circle- Canada, Denmark (Greenland), Finland, Iceland, Norway, Russia, Sweden, and the United States (Alaska).
Pick up a couple of books about one of these countries (we went with Goodnight Alaska and Goodnight Canada) and read about it.
This book also looks like a great way to introduce Inuit culture.
Iconic Images of Arctic Countries
I created this set of different images of arctic countries. All I did was have my daughter place them on the correct country (or just region) of a map. I wasn’t concerned about her being able to distinguish distinct countries from one another, but rather just wanted her to get an idea of different landscapes and cities in countries that border the Arctic Circle.
She also just really liked flipping through them and talking about places that interested her.
Those cards are available here.
Sensory Play
Northern Lights with Shaving Cream
Another one of my very favorite activities (and this one was great for my toddler as well!) I filled up a glass baking dish with shaving cream, gave my kids paints to match the colors of the northern lights, and let them stir the paints into the shaving cream.
Arctic Sensory Bin
Another great one that my toddler could join in on- we set up a sensory bin with white felt, arctic animals, and the igloo that we created. Simple, easy, and a great invitation for pretend play. (Plus, it was a mess free activity we did during a week where we’d been snowed in!)
Arctic Themed Books
I have a whole post on polar themed books for toddlers and preschoolers here, but if I could only pick one to include, it would be Hello World: Arctic Animals. It’s cute, informative, and great for toddlers and preschoolers alike.
Family Activity
If you have a zoo nearby with arctic animals, take a family trip!
(And if you’re looking for suggestions, the Louisville Zoo and the Indianapolis Zoo both have arctic exhibits. I have posts on both of them because we love them so much.)
Additional Winter Unit Themes
Lastly, if you’re looking for more winter preschool unit themes, check out my posts here for a Winter in the Woods preschool unit theme and a Discovering Snow preschool unit theme.
And if you’d like to dive deeper into Canada with your preschooler, that unit theme is coming soon! Be sure to follow along on Facebook or sign up for email updates.
