Huge List of Outdoor Winter Sensory Activities

During the warm months, it’s easy to get outdoor sensory activities into your child’s schedule. It is much more difficult when the ground is covered by snow and the temperature is below freezing. These winter sensory activities are designed to provide much-needed sensory input during the cold months. Use these ideas to ensure your students or kids get outside and burn off that energy.

Going outside in the winter isn’t my favourite thing. Some of my kids completely love the winter. For one of them, the colder, the better. For the ones that feel the way I do about the cold though, I have to be creative in coming up with enticing ideas to get them to stay active in the winter. Just because it’s cold outside doesn’t mean that their need for sensory input goes away so it’s important to find ways to create winter sensory activities.

Outdoor Winter Sensory Activities

Snow Angels
Snowball Fights
Rolling Down a Hill in the Snow
Tobogganning
Make a snow fort – Just be sure to do this with adult supervision as it can be dangerous if children get caught under collapsed snow.
Stomp patterns or words into the snow
Have a contest to see who can roll the biggest snowball
Go snowshoeing
Try cross-country or downhill skiing
Go ice skating
Set up an obstacle course in your backyard
Build an igloo with a snow block maker or use milk cartons to make your own snow block maker
Build a toboggan run
Winter Nature Hike
Shovelling Snow (great heavy work activity!)
Play tag in the snow
Hide plastic coins under the snow and have kids hunt for buried treasure
Winter Scavenger Hunt
Pour boiled maple syrup on the snow to make taffy – this is a French Canadian winter tradition