SENSE-ational Winter Scavenger Hunt

It can be challenging to remain active in the wintertime: It’s cold, the sun sets earlier, and your body feels tired. However, it’s still important to do so! Staying physically active improves your mental and physical health, reduces anxiety, lowers your risk of illnesses, strengthens muscles and bones, and even helps you sleep (Center for Disease Control, 2022). The recommendations for children’s physical activity are listed below.

Scavenger Hunts

One way you and your kiddos can stay active in the winter is by doing a scavenger hunt. Scavenger hunts are not only fun, they are also great for socializing with siblings or other peers, enhancing their sensory development through exploration and awareness of their senses, sequencing, organizing, and problem-solving skills, moving their body, and connecting with nature (Occupational Therapy Helping Children, n.d.). You may be thinking that coming up with a scavenger hunt in the winter is challenging due to your limited time and energy. Well, no worries! We have got that part covered.

If you feel it’s too cold to go outside, indoor winter sensory activities are a great option:

-Making ‘snow’

• (check out our blog next week where we deep dive into the ways you can do this!)

• Great for developing cognitive skills, creativity, problem-solving, and decision-making

-Winter sensory bin or bottle

• Great for providing tactile, visual, and proprioceptive input

-Cut snowflakes

• How to:

• Great for practicing fine and visual-motor skills. Depending on the type of paper you use it can be great proprioceptive input as well- the thicker the paper the heavier the work!

-DIY snowglobe

• Great for tactile input and practicing fine-motor skills, especially manipulation.

-Winter collages

• Great for practicing fine-motor skills, creativity skills, and providing tactile, auditory, and visual input

-Make paper plate snowmen

• Great for fine-motor skills and providing tactile input

Whatever you choose to do this winter, we hope you and your family stay safe and warm!

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References

Center for Disease Control. (2022). 6 tips to stay active this winter. https://www.cdc.gov/nccdphp/dnpao/features/stay-active-this-winter/index.html 

Gravino, Caroline. (2019). Homemade snowglobes. PBS. https://www.pbs.org/parents/crafts-and-experiments/homemade-snow-globes

Meredith. (2014). Winter texture collages. Homegrown Friends. https://homegrownfriends.com/home/winter-texture-collages/ 

Occupational Therapy Helping Children. (n.d.). Hidden benefits of scavenger hunts. https://www.occupationaltherapy.com.au/hidden-benefits-of-scavenger-hunts/#:~:text=Scavenger%20hunts%20can%20provide%20the,help%20keep%20your%20child%20regulated.

Super Simple. (2021). Snowman paper plate craft. https://supersimple.com/article/snowman-paper-plate-craft/ 

U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. (2018). Physical Activity Guidelines for Americans, 2nd edition. Retrieved fromhttps://health.gov/paguidelines/second-edition/pdf/Physical_Activity_Guidelines_2nd_edition.pdf