Paper Snowflake Matching Activities

Here’s a set of quick and simple paper snowflake activities for preschool and kindergarten. Use these to work on both fine motor and visual discrimination skills this winter.

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I always love cutting out paper snowflakes. It’s a fun little creative moment, trying to turn out something beautiful and interesting. We rarely get real snow this far south, but we can make our own “snowflakes” with just some scrap paper and a good pair of scissors.

So the other day I was cutting out a snowflake just for the heck of it, and I realized that I could cut out two identical ones at once.

But wait! Snowflakes can’t be identical! (as you can read in one of these children’s books about snow)

Here is my favorite book for these snowflake activities (ad):

So, with that in mind, I snipped out a couple of small differences. What I ended up with is a set of almost-matching snowflakes.

Snowflake Matching Activities

All you need to do in preparation is cut out some snowflakes. Then, you can play several matching games with your pretty results.

Preparation: How to Make the Snowflake “Pairs”

I made four snowflakes per letter-size sheet of paper. This gives you a nice size for little hands.

1. Cut a sheet of paper into quarters, and then trim so that you have squares (instead of rectangles.)
2. Stack two squares and fold them in half and then in half again.
3. Cut out two paper snowflakes at once (I made them this basic way)
4. Unfold and separate the two snowflakes. Then refold each one separately.
5. Cut a different small shape out of each folded snowflake. Like this:

You may want to laminate your results, or you may want to leave them unlaminated so that the children can re-fold them and open them.

Snowflake Matching Activities

The basic idea of each of these activities is for the children to find the similar snowflakes and then to identify the differences.

Snowflake Mat Activity

Place all the snowflakes in a small basket. The child will sit on a floor mat and lay out each snowflake. Then, he or she will pair up the almost-matching ones.

Snowflakes Around the Room

Place the snowflakes around the room. Then, have the children collect the pairs. Once they find all the matches, challenge them to spot the small differences.

Snowflake Partner Game

Randomly give each child a snowflake. The kids should walk around and find their “partner”. Then, have the children hold the snowflakes up to each other to identify what makes each unique.

Snowflake Concentration

Glue each snowflake to a colored card (use all the same color). Then spread all the cards out face down to play Concentration, a.k.a Memory.

Other Paper Snowflake Activities

Here are a few more ideas that use pre-cut paper snowflakes for preschool and kindergarten:

Do a snowflake rubbing: place a blank sheet of paper over a cutout snowflake and rub it with a crayon.

Fold/re-fold: give out folded snowflakes and have the children unfold them. Tell them to look at a folded shape, and then watch what happens as they unfold it. Then they can re-fold it and repeat.

Shape find: look for shapes cut into the snowflakes. You can call out a shape to find, provide a list to match to, or have a one-on-one or small group discussion about the shapes you see.

I hope these ideas gave you some fresh and fun indoor winter activities for your children.

Happy Teaching,

Heather