5 Fun Winter Break Activities for PreK Students

Looking for a fun learning activity for your PreK child to enjoy over Winter Break? Don’t miss these five activities, complete with supply lists, directions, and family reading tips!

1. Gingerbread Letters
A student’s ability to recognize and name letters and letter sounds is a fundamental reading skill that helps prepare them for kindergarten. Practice letter name recognition with this delicious cookie-inspired activity.

We based our recipe off of this no-cook recipe from Artful Parent, with an addition of gingerbread cookie spices!

Supplies:

• 1 Cup Flour
• ¼ Cup Salt
• 1 Tablespoon Cream of Tartar
• 1 Tablespoon Oil
• 1 Teaspoon Cinnamon
• 2 Teaspoons Ginger
• ¼ Teaspoon Cloves
• 1 Cup Boiling Water
• Food Coloring

Gingerbread Dough instructions:

• Mix the dough together either with a stand mixer or knead by hand.
• Mix together the flour, salt, cream of tartar, oil, cinnamon, ginger, and cloves.
• Add 1 drop of yellow, 2 drops of red food coloring, and 1 drop of green into the hot water.
• Pour the wet mix into the dry mix. Stir well and knead until it is no longer sticky but smooth. Let cool for 5 minutes.
  
  

Activity instructions:

• Use a rolling pin to roll the dough out (about ¼ inch thick).
• Stamp it with letter cookie cutters, or use a clean wet knife to cut out letters of your choosing.
• Encourage your child to stamp out letters of their name or fun holiday words like “hat,” “gift,” “bell,” “elf,” “star,” or snow.”

2. Snowman Letter Match
PreK students being able to identify, read, and write lowercase and uppercase letters is essential to kindergarten readiness. Students can use this activity to learn that uppercase letters have a special job (i.e., on names and places), and lowercase letters are used most often.

Supplies:

• Construction paper
• Scissors
• Glue or tap
• Markers or crayons

Activity instructions:

• Choose 5 - 10 letters from the alphabet that your child will write for the activity.
• Cut out one small circle and an equal number of medium and large circles from the construction paper for the three mains parts of a snowman.
• Ask your child to draw a snowman’s face on the smallest circle.
• On the medium circles, ask your child to write the uppercase letter.*
• On the large circles, ask your child to write a matching lowercase letter.*
• Practice letter matching by placing a medium circle (uppercase letter) under the snowman face and asking your child to find the large matching circle (lowercase letter)

*Check out this letter formation guide for practicing writing letters.

3. Hot Chocolate Alphabet Match
Turn your crafty cup of cocoa into a fun activity for matching lowercase and uppercase letters – and practicing letter names and sounds!

Check out a supply list and directions over on Toddler Approved - click here.

4. Snowball Letter Fight
Get active while learning with this winter-inspired activity that supports letter recognition skills.

Supplies:

• White construction paper
• Marker
• Tape
• Masking tape

Activity instructions:

• Choose 5 - 10 letters for your child to write
• Write one letter on each piece of construction paper
• Tape them evenly spaced out on the wall
• For the snowball, crumple a couple of pieces of construction paper and wrap them in masking tape to hold it together.
• Encourage your child to say a letter name and then throw their “snowball” at the matching letter on the wall.

5. Finger Painting Fun with Frosting!
In addition to recognizing and naming letters, learning to write letters with the correct letter formation is an important skill for PreK students to be able to learn to read when they get to kindergarten. Use this fun activity to practice letter formation (and enjoy a yummy treat!).

Supplies:

• Icing
• Little candies (M&Ms, sprinkles, crushed candy cane, etc.
• Tray or plate

Activity Instructions:

• Spread icing on a tray or plate into a relatively flat/smooth area
• Encourage your child to trace a letter into the icing with their finger; practice letters that are commonly mixed up, for ex: b and d, m and w, p and q
• Use the little candies to build letters too, or fill in the finger-traced letters.