Kids don't always know what it means to dress for the season. Sometimes they'll come running out of their room in a swimsuit in the middle of winter, or walk around in gloves and snow boots in the summer. This is a quick lesson to help teach them what to wear during each season.
This lesson can be done all in one day, or get creative and have some fun play time with the kids and extend the lesson over the course of a week. It's up to you and your homeschooling style. First gather some old baby clothes from different seasons. If you've already purged your stockpile of old baby clothes, hit up the second hand stores and see if you can find a few cheap outfits you can use for the lesson, and then either donate back or save for the kids to play with. Some great second hand stores in the Omaha area are Goodwill or Once Upon a Child. If possible, you can also borrow the baby clothes from a friend who may still have these on hand.
Some ideas for items to collect are swimsuits, raincoats, sandals, boots, snow coats, sweaters, sundresses, jeans, shorts, tank tops, light weight jackets or anything else you can get your hands on that can be used to represent a season. Once you have a collection of clothes, put them in a box, trunk or suitcase for the kids to rummage through later. Now pick out some of the kids dolls. These could be baby dolls or stuffed animals. Try to pick something that doesn't have a tail so it fits better into the clothes, but then again, that might add to the fun.
Once you have everything gathered tell the kids we're going to play a fun game of pretend, but we have the responsibility of making sure our babies are dressed for the right season. Pick one of the seasons to start with and tell the kids you are going outside to do something relevant to that season. For example, for summer you are taking the babies to the beach, for spring you're going out to pick flowers, the winter activity could be going out to build a snow man and autumn could be going out to pick apples. Only pick one of the seasons to start with, and move on to another one depending on how long the game lasts for the kids during that season. If they have big imaginations and spend the entire morning or afternoon on it, then wait until the next day to do the whole game over with a different season.
After you have your scenario described, show the kids the stash of baby clothes. Let them know you have a problem and you need them to help you solve it. All of the clothes got jumbled up in this box (trunk or suitcase if applicable) and you don't know what the babies should wear, so you need their help. Have fun going through the clothes, talking about the seasons and what the weather is like in the pretend scenario to help them decide what to dress their babies in. Make sure they are making the right choices and ask questions about why they chose what they did if they choose something other than what is appropriate for the weather. Help guide them to the right clothes and acknowledge their reasonings when they give them to you.
Finally, with baby dolls dressed and kids with their pretend mission, let them play out the scenario. Read books that relate if you have some, and just let the kids run with the story line. Let them play with their dolls in the pretend season, and if the real weather is good, let them go outside to play with their dolls.
This is a great lesson to not only teach the appropriate attire for the seasons and weather, but it's also a wonderful hands on lesson and a fun bonding game to play with them as you can get involved in the pretend play as well.
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