Snowflake Themed Math Activities

Even if you don’t live somewhere that gets a lot of snow, adding snowflakes to your classroom themes can be a lot of fun. They’re a great way to learn about symmetry, patterns and just to use in math learning.

For example, you can practice math facts up to 10 with these free printables from Math Geek Mama. They include addition and subtraction facts and kids color in all the snowflakes with problems that have the same solution (for example every problem where the answer is 5).

Work on multiplication facts and break the code with this activity from Royal Baloo. The download comes with questions that are answered by decoding multiplication problems where the answers stand for different letters. You could use the same code to write your own secret messages, too.

HoJo’s Teaching Adventures has a snowflake puzzle activity that includes addition, subtraction, multiplication and division. You can get it when you give your email address. You know where to put the puzzle pieces because the math sentence on one piece matches the answer on the other.

Graph out the number of each different kind of snowflake with this snowflake I-spy graphing activity from Schooltime Snippets. Kids can mark each snowflake as they count them with a dot marker, or color them in with different colors of crayons.

Symmetry is an important aspect of snowflakes, and kids can play with shapes of different numbers of sides to make their own symmetrical snowflake patterns. This activity from A Little Pinch of Perfect has printable tanagram shapes kids can use to make a snowflake on a template, then count up the number of each shape they used.

Here’s another project using pattern block shapes to make snowflakes from Frugal Fun for Boys and Girls.

This one is maybe more art than math, but you can also have kids complete the snowflake with different geometric shapes with this activity from As Told By Mom.

Snowflake Suduko Game

Next Plan Idea:

Make Multiplication Fun with Crafts and Games

The celebration of Our Lady of Guadalupe is important throughout Mexico and other parts of the world. Her feast day is Dec. 12, and the celebrations honoring her appearance to Juan Diego in 1531 begin a few days before that.

Whether you celebrate yourself or just want to share about the celebration at home or in your classroom, Las Mañanitas: The Beautiful Celebration of Our Lady of Guadalupe is a good place to start. The book, by Ernesto Joel Vega Rosales and Jeanette Gonzalez Seneviratne, with illustrations by Dana Sanmar, tells the story of a family’s celebration of the feast day in both English and Spanish.

They prepare with a novena, which is nine days of prayers and preparations. The children, Lucia and Pablo, are given special outfits made by their grandmother that look like what Juan Diego might have worn when he saw Our Lady. The book describes the prayers that are made each day, such as a prayer for respect for life, for families and for the indigenous people of the Americas, to name a few.

As told in the book, Juan Diego was a native Mexican born near modern day Mexico City. His given name was Cuaauhtlatoatzin, which means “He who speaks like an eagle.” When he converted to Christianity his name was changed to Juan Diego, and as he walked to church he passed a hill called Tepeyac. One day he heard the birds singing especially beautifully and a voice called him to go to the top of the hill.

There he saw Our Lady of Guadalupe, who asked him to tell the bishop she wanted a chapel built in her name at the foot of the hill. The bishop asked for a sign that Juan Diego really saw her, and later she had him collect flowers that she blessed and take them to the bishop. When Juan Diego dropped the flowers, an image of Our Lady could be seen on his cloak, which is still on display in her basilica to this day.

The feast day is celebrated as mañanitas, which includes singing, indigenous music and dancing, and children presenting flowers to Our Lady. Juan Diego is remembered today as being humble, brave and faithful, and was the first indigenous American made a saint.

The book is colorful and tells the story in a clear way, and it’s fun to have it both in English and Spanish if you teach Spanish or speak Spanish at home or in the classroom. It’s a great way to learn the basics of the celebration and the story of Juan Diego and why he is still remembered today.

About the book: 40 pages, paperback, published 2024 by Loyola Press. Suggested retail price $14.99.

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