Make a hibernating bear craft with preschoolers. Give each student a paper cup. Rip up several sheets of brown construction paper and give each student a small pile of paper pieces. Help children glue the pieces to the cup to create the bear’s lair in which she hibernates. Allow the glue to dry. Next give the students small paper cutouts featuring images of sleeping bears. Pre-draw these bears and make copies, since drawing a sleeping bear might be too difficult for preschoolers. Allow children to draw on the bears and decorate them. Place the paper bears under the cups and explain to students that this represents the bears’ winter sleep in their dens.
Read students storybooks about hibernation. Several options include Catherine Walters’ “When Will it Be Spring?” in which a baby bear wakes his mother from hibernation to ask her when spring will come. Consider Karma Wilson’s “The Bear Snores On,” in which several small animals take refuge from the winter in a hibernating bear’s den. After reading the stories to the children, ask them to draw pictures depicting their interpretations of the narratives. This gives preschoolers a chance to learn about hibernation and create their own representations of this new concept, helping them thoroughly understand and remember what they have learned.
Make a hibernation den out of a brown paper bag. This activity might be too complex for preschoolers to complete by themselves, so make a single paper bag lair and allow the children to help. Cut 3 inches off the top of a brown paper lunch bag to make it shorter. Cut an arched den door in one side of the bag. Puff the bag open so the door appears to be at the front of the den. Glue cotton balls around the entrance to the den to represent winter snow. Place leaves or dry grass that the children find outside in the den as the bears’ bed. Put a toy plastic bear, a plush bear or a paper cutout of a sleeping bear inside the den. Explain to students that the bear will remain in the lair for the rest of winter as it hibernates.
Play a hibernating-animals game with your preschool class and make forts together. Allow children to pretend to be animals that hibernate. Children might opt to act like chipmunks, bears or squirrels. Use blankets and pillows usually reserved for nap-time to make forts in your preschool area. Spread blankets over the tops of chairs and place pillows on the floor of the fort for cushioning. Explain the concept of hibernation and allow children to play in the fort, which is their den. At nap-time, encourage the children to hibernate in the fort, representing the animals they are reenacting.