Classroom lesson 路 Sport馃嚫馃嚜 Sweden

Sweden on snow and ice

Winters so long, the whole country becomes one big sports field

Cross-country skiers crossing a snowy Scandinavian landscape

Photo 路 Wikimedia Commons

What is it?

For nearly half the year, much of Sweden is covered in snow. Instead of staying indoors, Swedes go outside and turn the snow and ice into sport. Ice hockey, cross-country skiing and downhill skiing are part of growing up for many Swedish children.

Tell me more

Cross-country skiing is the most Swedish sport of all. Skiers slide across long flat tracks, using their arms to push off with poles. It is brilliant exercise - your whole body works at once - and you can travel huge distances. Some Swedes use cross-country skis just to get to the shops in winter.

Once a year, around 16,000 skiers take part in a giant race called Vasaloppet. They ski 90 kilometres in one day - about the distance from London to Brighton. It is the biggest cross-country ski race in the world, and it has been held in Sweden every year since 1922.

Ice hockey is Sweden's most-watched team sport in winter. Two teams of six players skate around a sheet of ice trying to hit a small black disc (the puck) into the other team's net using long sticks. Sweden's national team is called 'Tre Kronor' - 'Three Crowns' - and has won the World Championship eleven times.

Many Swedish children learn to skate before they can ride a bike. Schools often have an ice rink in the playground in winter, and lakes freeze so solid you can walk - or skate - across them. There's a special kind of ice skating called 'long-distance skating' where people travel for tens of kilometres across frozen lakes, with sandwiches in their backpacks.

In the classroom

Walk your class through this in 15 minutes.

Talk together

Discussion prompts

  1. 01Sport that you do in your country probably depends on the weather. What sports happen because of the climate where you live?
  2. 02Why might it help to learn a sport at the same age as you learn to walk or ride a bike?
  3. 03How might skiing 90 kilometres in one day feel by the end? What kind of training would you need?
Try this

Classroom activity

Find out the longest distance anyone in your class has ever walked, cycled, or run in one day. Compare it to 90 km (the Vasaloppet). On a map, mark how far that would take you from your school. Could you imagine doing it on skis?