Improving Visualizing Skills With a Roll-a-Snowman Dice Activity

If you enjoyed my pumpkin visualizing activity for the fall season, you’re going to love the winter-themed “Roll a Snowman” version of the activity! Engage your students in rolling dice to create snowmen using the different descriptive words. More often than not, the snowmen come out looking VERY silly, which makes it fun for the students to visualize and illustrate.

A Quick Review of Visualizing

Visualizing is when students create mental pictures using details from a text. Through visualization activities, students quickly realize the power of language and discover how words can bring images to mind and stories to life. With descriptive and sensory language, students can experience what something looks, tastes, feels, sounds, and smells like… all while reading a poem or a book!

Getting Started with Snowman Visualizing

Get ready for some visualizing fun with this easy to prep winter activity! Whether you choose to create your own chart or plan to use my “ready to go” resource, you’ll want to introduce the skills and pre-teach the activity. Use the poem below to jumpstart a discussion with your students about what it means to visualize. Then, take a few minutes to brainstorm different adjectives that could go along with shape, size, and color of a snowman. Click here or the image below to download your free copy!

Activity Directions

Read the poem (optional) and review what visualizing is.
Ask students to brainstorm different adjectives that could describe a snowman (i.e., color, shape, size). This can be done with a partner or as a whole group. Encourage them to think about their five senses when they come up with the descriptive words!
Create your own chart, or introduce the 3-column or 5-column chart from my ready-to-go resource. Review all the descriptive words.
Have the students work independently or with a partner to roll dice and “build” silly snowmen.
Ask the students to record their adjectives and visualize their snowmen. They can illustrate their snowmen on the graphic organizer provided, or you can use “fancy” paper for a bulletin board display!

Activity Extensions

Make it a STEM challenge and have them build the snowman out of fun materials (e.g., playdoh, modeling clay, recycled materials, cotton balls).
Ask the students to write a story about their silly snowmen.
Create your very own “Roll-a-______” chart! Have the students choose a character (e.g., penguin, polar bear, robot, etc.). It can be winter-themed or just an everyday animal or character. Let the students choose the categories and the descriptive words and see where the fun takes you!

Add this activity to your winter literacy toolbox! Create your own chart or grab the “print + go” charts in my resource to use for morning work or as a quick literacy center. It’s even the perfect “sub activity” to keep in your back pocket or to assign virtually (just use online dice!).