Snowman Crafts and Activities

snowman activities

Looking for a snowman craft to help kids develop fine motor skills during the winter months? These snowman activities and snowman crafts are perfect for using in occupational therapy interventions or to build skills! Here you will find snowman activities for fine motor, gross motor, sensory tolerance, pencil grasp, handwriting, math, scissor skills, sensory experiences, and other learning/school tasks. Use the snowman crafts and sensory activities to make winter fun a skill-building moment! For wintery fun, browse the ideas below.

Add this snowman theme to your weekly therapy theme list for themed therapy activities that are done for you.

snowman activities and snowman crafts for kids to develop skills in therapy and at home.

Snowman Crafts

Let’s start with snowman crafts that build fine motor skills. We know that kids crafts have a powerful benefit when it comes to developing fine motor precision, hand strength, functional use of craft tools like glue bottles, scissors, crafting materials. When kids use these craft items to create, they are using the occupation of crafting to develop skills for that specific task, but also to carryover to other functional tasks. When it comes to occupational therapy, crafts are a means and a technique to functional skill development!

These snowman crafts are just one theme in the selection of winter craft ideas that we have on the website.

Check out the selection of snowman themed crafts below. From the paper snowman, to toilet paper snowman crafts, these creative snowman craft ideas will have you covered on fun ways to help kids build motor skills and executive functioning skills this winter.

These snowman crafts cover a variety of materials and skills. Choose the ones that work for your needs, and available materials. Kids can improve areas including: pinch, grasp, precision, cutting, glue use, bilateral coordination, eye-hand coordination, and more.

Snowman Glitter Craft

There is just something about kids and glitter! But did you know the fine motor benefits of a glitter snowman craft? Use stamp art to make a snowman but with a sparkly paint when you mix glitter into paint to create this textured snowman. Work on precision, fine motor skills, texture tolerance, and address eye-hand coordination with this stamp glitter snowman craft.

Kids will also love to paint real snow. Here’s how to paint snow using spray bottles to double down on the fine motor skills.

This glittery snowman is a fun craft idea that works on boosting important fine motor skills that are needed for pencil grasp, fastener manipulation, and the opening and closing of containers and food products!  All of these are essential skills needed for a child to become more independent in their daily task performance.

Making a textured snowman is fun with the Disguise a Snowman activity in the Snowman Therapy Kit. Add sequins, glitter, and puffy paint, or other fine motor items like beads, string, and more to disguise a snowman!

Paper snowman Craft-

There are many ways to make a paper snowman, and when kids cut and paste, they are building fine motor skills with basic, everyday craft materials. Plus, there are tons of fun and creative ways to make a paper snowman, too, so this is a wintery craft idea that can be extended while working on motor skill development. Try some of these paper snowman craft ideas:

  • Use junk mail to make a paper snowman collage.
  • Cut and paste a Snowman countdown craft to make a paper chain snowman.
  • Make a snowman suncatcher and build fine motor skills.
  • Create a sensory tolerance activity with this shredded paper snowman.
  • Work on letter identification with this snowman letter craft.
  • Cut round circles and glue them together to build a snowman from paper.
  • Build a paper snowman using the templates in the Snowman Therapy Kit. The materials are all there for you. Kids can color the objects and cut them out while working on scissor skills. The paper snowman templates are large, so this is a great gross motor task for building or attaching to a bulletin board or magnetic wall to work on core strength and working on a vertical, too.

Egg carton snowman-

Egg cartons are a great therapy tool, but when you make an egg carton snowman, you get many fine motor benefits too. Work on in-hand manipulation and eye-hand coordination skills with this cute egg carton snowman!

For another way to use egg cartons to make a snow friend, try this Egg Carton Snowman. It’s a another fun craft idea that children will love and it works on important fine motor hand skills to include a tripod grasp, intrinsic hand strength, arch development, and an open web space. How? By implementing the use of scissors, bottle glue, marker, and skewers. Easy to create, but so effective in skill development and children will have so much fun doing it!

Toilet paper Snowman Craft-

Grab a toilet paper tube or a paper towel roll and start painting it white. Then, cut the paper tube into sections. These make great tacking tubes to work on fine motor skills and bilateral coordination. Add a few snowman details like a scarf, black dots for buttons, and coal. Draw on a carrot and you’ve got a fine motor toilet paper snowman!

Stacking toilet paper snowmen is really cute way to work on fine motor skills while building snowman towers!  That’s right, towers of toilet paper snowmen in which a child uses tongs (or hands) to pick up and sort snowmen into towers by stacking them on top of each other.  Sort, build the tallest tower, or simply just stack! This activity easily works on fine motor control, strengthening and endurance, and grading of movement. 

Sticker Snowman Craft-

We used paper reinforcement stickers to create a snowman craft with big fine motor benefits. This is a great way to work on precision and dexterity with this fine motor snowman craft. Kids can peel off the small paper reinforcements and place then precisely on paper using neat pincer grasp, eye-hand coordination, and separation of the sides of the hand in order to make the sticker snowman. Plus, kids love using paper reinforcement stickers!

Cotton Ball Snowman Craft

Using cotton balls or craft pom poms to make a snowman is a fun way to build fine motor skills, too. We used craft pom poms to make this clothespin snowman but cotton balls would work, too.

For more cotton ball snowmen, try these ideas:

  • Stamp and paint to make this snowman art activity using materials in your home.
  • Dab a cotton ball into glue (pincer grasp) and then press it onto paper or a textured background (arch development and hand strength) to build a 3D snowman.

Paper Plate Snowman Craft-

Emotion Snowmen Paper Plates is an easy to create paper plate activity that works on facial emotion identification and awareness with the theme of snowmen. Kids can make their own emotional faces or they can be premade to work on social emotional skills. Make duplicate plates and create a matching game as a way to work on visual memory too!

For another paper plate snowman idea use the snowball templates in the Snowman Therapy Kit. Kids can cut out the large snowball circles and glue them to paper plates. Then, build a snowman using the paper plates. Kids can then decorate their snowman and work on fine motor skills.

Snowman Activities

Below, you’ll find more snowman fun. I’ve broken these snowman activities and therapy ideas into areas designed to help kids develop specific skills. You’ll find snowman activities for fine motor development, gross motor skills, and motor planning. You’ll love the craft ideas that challenge visual perceptual skills and sensory tolerance. Each activity can also build on several skill areas.

Deep Breathing Snowman is a fun mindfulness, deep breathing printable to use as a sensory coping strategy with kids throughout the winter season. Simply print and teach children to follow the visual prompts on the snowman to trace and pause at each white dot and hold their breath to achieve a calming effect.

Snowman Brain Breaks- Kids love the self-regulation strategies using whole body movements with a snowman theme. These exercises get kids moving, and are a great way to add mindful movement during the winter months when it can be a challenge to get outdoors. You can find these snowman brain breaks in the Snowman Therapy Kit.

Snowman Executive Functioning Activity (Make a Snowman Treat)- Cooking in the kitchen is a powerful way to develop fine motor skills and executive functioning skills. Use cucumbers and vegetables to make this snowman snack. Click here for the snowman snack directions.

Pin the Nose on a Snowman- This gross motor snowman activity is a great way to develop specific gross motor skills like hopping, skipping, squatting, and balance. The coordination tasks are on the snowman noses and when kids pin the nose on the snowman, they get a gross motor movement break, too. You’ll find this winter activity in the Snowman Therapy Kit.

Snowman Self-Regulation Activity– This deep breathing activity can be a coping tool or a sensory strategy to help with self-regulation skills. Included is a free printable deep breathing worksheet. Click here for a snowman deep breathing activity.

Snowman Puzzles- There are so many reasons why I love these snowman puzzles. Kids can trace the snowman, color in the picture, and then cut out the paper puzzles. Plus, they can build the puzzle and work on visual perceptual skills, too. In the Snowman Therapy Kit, you’ll find simple and complex snowman puzzles and a variety of puzzle tasks for this winter theme.

Snowman Sensory Activity– Use this baking soda dough recipe to make a sensory and fine motor material that kids can use to build skills. The baking soda dough provides a resistant material for strengthening hands. Click here to for the snowman baking soda dough directions.

Snowman Gross Motor (slide deck)– Incorporate bilateral coordination, motor planning, crossing midline, and other gross motor skill areas with this snowman activity. Kids can follow along to the slide images. This makes a great brain break activity, too. This is a free Google slide deck. Click here for the snowman bilateral coordination activities.

Snowman Fine Motor Activity– This counting/adding/subtracting activity builds eye-hand coordination, and fine motor skills. Make snowmen from recycled egg cartons. This is a great activity for breaking down numbers. Click here for this snowman math activity.

Another great fine motor snowman activity is the bead copying cards in the Snowman Therapy Kit. Kids can cut out the bead cards and then copy the patterns to make a string of beads while developing fine motor skills, eye-hand coordination, and visual motor skills.

Snowman Eye-Hand Coordination Activity- We’ve made a ton of virtual therapy Slide decks for occupational therapy services, and this snowman themed task is one more. Use this build a snowman activity in virtual lessons or teletherapy to work on eye-hand coordination, visual scanning, handwriting, or typing.

Graph a Snowman- For kids working on executive functioning skills like metacognition, organization, task completion, prioritization, and planning, a “graph a snowman” task is a great activity. You’ll find this printable resource in our Snowman Therapy Kit.

More Snowman Crafts and Activities for Therapy

Kids are loving our latest therapy kit! The Snowman Therapy Kit covers all aspects of therapy skill areas: gross motor, fine motor, self-regulation, visual perception, executive function, handwriting, scissor skills, and more! Read all about the Snowman Therapy Kit here.

Snowman Therapy Activity Kit

Colleen Beck, OTR/L has been an occupational therapist since 2000, working in school-based, hand therapy, outpatient peds, EI, and SNF. Colleen created The OT Toolbox to inspire therapists, teachers, and parents with easy and fun tools to help children thrive. Read her story about going from an OT making $3/hour (after paying for kids’ childcare) to a full-time OT resource creator for millions of readers. Want to collaborate? Send an email to contact@theottoolbox.com.

Indoor Recess Ideas

indoor recess ideas

Looking for indoor recess ideas? Below, you’ll find winter indoor games and activities to add to the recess line up when it’s too cold to go outdoors for recess. We’ve tried to come up with indoor recess games for older kids AND indoor recess ideas for kindergarten and the younger grades. Some of these ideas work well with traditional indoor recess group activities, and others are better suited for socially distancing during indoor recess, while still allowing kids to move! All of the inside recess ideas can be used to add activity and movement when it’s raining or too cold for outdoor recess!

During the winter months, kids can have trouble staying active! These indoor recess ideas will help with adding movement, bilateral coordination, motor planning, and development through indoor games.



Indoor Recess Winter Activities for Kids

Here are more ways to get the kids moving this time of year:

MONDAY- INDOOR RECESS IDEAS

TUESDAY- 
WINTER BRAIN BREAK IDEAS

WEDNESDAY- 
WINTER BILATERAL COORDINATION ACTIVITIES

THURSDAY-
WINTER MINDFULNESS ACTIVITIES

FRIDAY- 
WINTER FINE MOTOR ACTIVITIES


Indoor Recess Ideas

This time of year can be a real struggle for kids. They’ve got a long school day, where it’s too cold to go outside for recess. Many are on screens during much of that day, especially if schooling is done virtually or at home with distance learning.

After school brings continued cold temps and an  followed by coming home to an early sunset. Not to mention, many kids have after-school activities scheduled. It’s no wonder that kids are less active than ever before.

Because of this, I wanted to share these indoor recess ideas that can be used to add activity, motor planning, visual motor skills, midline crossing, and general movement!

1. Turn on the music and have a Crossing Gross Motor March. Crossing Midline is a developmental ability that is important for so many gross motor tasks.  When a child has difficulty with crossing midline, they may demonstrate inefficiency with other areas like fine motor skills, bilateral coordination, hand dominance, self-care, reading, handwriting, and so many other areas. This can be done in a socially distanced format in a well-spaced out area such as a gym or hallway. And, for our virtual learners, this activity is fun for the whole family.


2. Add proprioceptive and vestibular input with an Indoor Skating activity! All you need for this activity is a pile of paper plates or old tissue boxes. If you have a carpeted area in the classroom, this can be a great way to identify a space for indoor ice skating during indoor recess. Add specific moves and have kids copy the ice skating moves to really incorporate motor planning and direction following.


3. Do the Hokey Pokey. Need some fresh ideas when it comes to the classic hokey pokey? Try playing “Snow-key Pokey” with a snowman theme. Just label the various body parts a snowman would have. For example: Snow cap, stick arms, boots, snow bottom, etc.


4. Animal Races- Gather a group of kids and have relay races in the hallway or gymnasium area. Kids can split into two teams and race against one another. Each child will need to come up with an animal walk as they race back to tag another person on their team. Some animal walk ideas include: donkey kicks, penguin waddles, bear walks, crab walks, frog jumps, elephant walks, snake slithers, etc.


5. Arctic Animal Yoga- Add animal walks with an artic theme. These would go perfectly with an animal theme and add the bonus of calming stretches. They are a great movement break during the day, use at circle time, morning meeting, free time or for use during stations. These cards are fun for use during physical education or in group/individual physical and occupational therapy. They are a great way to add simple movement into the day which we know is essential for learning and concentration. Use them with an arctic unit! These polar bear gross motor therapy activities can be used as a winter brain break or recess activity.


6. Freeze Dance- Turn on YouTube and dance to the music. When the music stops, everyone needs to FREEZE!


7. Charades- Ask each student to write on a slip of paper a character, animal, or object. Combine themes from the curriculum, favorite books, or movies. Students can act out the people or objects on the cards while the rest of the class guesses what the student is describing with movement.


8. Indoor Balance Beam- Try some of these indoor balance beams using everyday items or a roll of painters tape. There are so many benefits to using balance beams. It’s a fun way to break up indoor recess into centers, too.


9. Ribbon Wand Dance- Make a handful of DIY ribbon wands and sneak in some gross motor skills and movement by dancing to music.


10. Indoor Gross Motor Game- Get the whole class involved in gross motor play with jumping, hopping, and more with this Dinosaur Gross Motor Game uses mini dinosaur figures. Grab the free printable game spinner and activity here


11. Bean Bag Games- This group gross motor core strengthening activity is a fun way to get the whole class involved in a group game! Make it a winter theme with these snowflake bean bags.


12. Play the Four Corners Classroom Game Add movement and sneak in some auditory processing work with this fun game shared over on The Game Gal.


13. Who Am I Game- The kids can write down book and movie characters on a sticky note and stick it to their forehead. They can ask other students questions as they move around the room, trying to figure out who they “are”!

11. Winter Toothpick Art– Use the Winter Fine Motor Kit materials to get kids moving with the toothpick art activities. These can be used on cardboard or a carpeted area to help kids build fine motor strength and tripod grasp.

12. Winter Crumble Art- This is another fun fine motor activity for indoor recess. Use bits of tissue paper or crumbled up construction paper to create a winter picture. These sheets are in the Winter Fine Motor Kit, too.

I hope these ideas are helpful in creating opportunities for movement and activity during these indoor recess months at school! 

winter fine motor kit

The Winter Fine Motor Kit has materials to print-and-go, including arctic animal finger puppets to develop finger isolation, toothpick art activities with winter themes, crumble art pages, coloring and pencil control activities for building strength and endurance in the hands. All of these materials are included in a 100 page packet with winter themes: snowmen, mittens, snowflakes, penguins, polar bears, arctic animals, and more.

 

Add gross motor play and activities to the classroom with indoor recess ideas that get the kids moving.
 

Colleen Beck, OTR/L has been an occupational therapist since 2000, working in school-based, hand therapy, outpatient peds, EI, and SNF. Colleen created The OT Toolbox to inspire therapists, teachers, and parents with easy and fun tools to help children thrive. Read her story about going from an OT making $3/hour (after paying for kids’ childcare) to a full-time OT resource creator for millions of readers. Want to collaborate? Send an email to contact@theottoolbox.com.