The only time my child has seen snow is when she was about six months old, and a freak "blizzard" blew threw town which resulted in a whopping inch or so of glistening powder. I hauled by sweet infant out dressed for an igloo overnight to snap a couple of shots. No snow since.
How do you teach a child to wonder at something she will never see? This question speaks to many deep yearnings of the heart and is more worthy of a cheap attempt to answer here. But one practical approach is, of course, to read about the mysterious and the unknown.
So here is an abbreviated list of books about snow, snowmen, and winter in general (real winter, that is) that we have been reading and re-reading all "winter" while sitting in our air conditioned home, or in the park on a warm, sunny, January day.
Snow by Uri Shulevitz
We adore this book. A little boy and his dog excitedly welcome individual snowflakes and proclaim the snow despite everyone telling them that snow is not coming. This book feels magical. It harkens many a night, sneaking into the hall to look out the window that gave the best view of the street.....will the snow come? Will school close and can we stay home and build snowmen and sled in the backyard? The colors and symbology are amazing - the world is grey, and then the snow comes and everything is magical white. We also take the opportunity to use this as a counting book, and count the snowflakes on each page. This book works on so many levels - imagery, poetry, counting. This is definitely one of our favorites and we have been renewing our library loan since before Thanksgiving. Probably time to take it back and buy our own copy, so someone else can learn of the magic that snow brings!
Over and Under the Snow
What a lovely book! The scientist in me loves this nature walk of a book, which explains what happens in nature during winter. It is a snowy adventure in the woods and a lesson in woodland animals in one. The artwork is amazing - both beautiful and effective at making clear the distinction between the worlds both over and under.
Another nature walk in the snow, but with more lyrical text. This book also does a good job of broaching the subject of nature in winter, but can read aloud easier and quicker. Little one can sit and listen to the lyrical text and take in the artwork without the great explanations and questions that she usually comes up with for the similar work above.
At first, I didn't understand what the hype was about. This is a relatively new book that is in high demand - I waited nearly three months to check out a copy, and it is splashed on reading lists everywhere. But the truth is, my daughter absolutely LOVES this book. The artwork alone is captivating - who doesn't want to page through woodland creatures careening downhill on a red sled? But to get the full effect, I think you have to be comfortable in your voice-acting and silly sound effects to fully "narrate" this tome whose only written words are sounds (is it plagiarizing to type "Scrinch Scrunch" here??) The truth is, this book does a great job of cultivating an adventurous mind...your imagination is left to fill in the blanks left by the lack of narration.
Snowballs
by
Lois Ehlert
Some of my favorite things are creating and reading, and this book represents the perfect blend. The story is simple: it snowed, and we made a snow family. The beauty is in the artwork, where the snow family comes to life with a collection of wonderful things, from knit bags to shoe strings, fruit to rocks. We have a blast just going through the pages and naming all of the trinkets and knick-knacks that give the snow family life. Hard to get more imaginative than to think of the plethora of uses for a popcorn kernel!
Snowmen at Night
I love this silly tale. Apparently lots of people do, since there are many books in this series. But I didn't know that at the time....I just thought I had found the cutest book about why snowmen look different the next day. My husband, the ever-realist who hates fiction and calls myths "lies," would probably hate this book. "Snowmen look different because they melt" he would state, and would likely launch a lecture about the water cycle. Of course, being a scientist myself, I would appreciate that approach to learning as well. But to indulge in a world where snowmen dance and play and sled the night away is just too much fun!
Winter Is the Warmest Season
by Lauren Stringer
This book articulates feelings that I have always held but never thought enough about to verbalize. The juxtaposition of reality (cold winters) and perception (the warmth of close family gatherings, cuddling by a fire etc) is a great way to explore feelings.
The First Day of Winter
I sing this book. Instead of giving gifts of birds and rings and ladies dancing (never understood how one gives gifts of people in this song), this book builds a snowman over the first 10 days of winter. Never mind that there are few locales I know of where a snowman would stick around for 10 days to be decked in all of it's adornments. It is a fun read/sing-aloud.
The Jacket I Wear in the Snow
A great book for early reading skills. The text is repetitive, and key words are represented by pictures in the text. I think that this book helped Little One understand that written words are symbols for spoken words/concepts/things. I think that we will look for more books like this as we progress toward learning to read.
Oh!
At first glance, this book is just a sweet and simple story about animals and children playing in the snow. But on our second time reading it, my sweet two year old noticed something that I had not - each individual picture is connected to the picture before (for example, the picture of the dog has the cat's tail in the corner from the picture before). I was so amazed at how she put together that connection - she even said "the cat is behind the dog!" This became one of her favorite snow stories. She also has a thing for cardinals, insisting that they are not red birds, but cardinals. Melts my heart.
What books about winter/snow do you like to read?
Snow is magical to children. What a fun series of books about the mysteries of snow!!
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