Street Traffic... End of Transportation

Hello Hippos!  We had another great week learning and exploring types of transportation!  Many of the centers were focused on transportation you find on the roads.  Below is a list of the activities and pictures centered around our theme:

• The week began by brainstorming and showing different pictures of vehicles that go on the road. We discussed the differences between vehicles such as a school bus and a city bus. We also brainstormed the different types of trucks! (participating as a member of a group, confident behavior, voice volume)
• Our letter was J for jeans, jump and jelly.
• We counted real rocks to fill our dump trucks. (one to one counting, number recognition)
• We sorted vehicles by land, air, train tracks and water.  We counted the pictures and compared the 4 columns. (comparing numbers..more, less, equal)
• Everyone had a ball washing our matchbox cars with soapy water and toothbrushes!(sensory)
• We played the rainbow car game this week in which we picked a colored cube from a bag without looking.  Whatever color we picked we moved that colored car one space. It was fun to try and predict what color we would pull from the bag and which colored car would win the race.  This game lent itself to counting, comparing numbers, colors and predicting.
• Our arch turned into a carwash with tickets and scooters.  We showed the students a video of a car going through the car wash.  If you get a chance take your child to a carwash someday. (gross motor)
• Each of us showed respectful behavior as we practiced "thinking the answer in our head" while another student was called on to give an answer from the question cards. We read clues and we had to guess which vehicle it was.
• We signed in to which was our favorite: train, car, plane or boat.  We counting and compared the numbers.  We then wrote in our journal about which was our favorite and drew a picture of it.
• During center time, we traced over real license plates with crayons and practiced recognizing the letters/numbers. (fine motor, letter and number recognition)
• Everyone enjoyed playing the parking lot game in which we rolled a dice, found the number on parking space, then parked our car in that space. (recognizing numbers)
• We also played another parking lot game in which we counted the dots on the parking spaces and matched them to the correct number on the car. (one to one counting)
• During group time we pretended to be a car wash.  Two students squirted the car (which was another student) with soapy water (empty squirt bottles) and the other 4 students dried the car by fanning them with paper.  The person being the car rode on a scooter.
• The hippos loved making a stop/go sign.  We played the stop/go game in which the students followed the sign I held up during gym class. We also did transportation yoga. (cutting, letter/word recognition, following directions, gross motor)
• During center time we experimented with different textures on our ramps using sand paper and kitchen liners. Which texture made the cars go faster or slower?  (taking turns, working together, resolving conflict if it arises)
• The hippos also enjoyed playing with trucks in playdoh and steering the sit and spins. They also enjoyed playing with shaving cream and construction trucks (sensory).
• We used a squirt bottle with water to pretend to wash cars on the easel.  Our teacher said the letter and sound and we squirted that car. (letter recognition/fine motor/building upper body)
• We signed our names on clouds at the easel. (building upper body strength which builds muscles used for writing)
• Our sensory table was filled with water, tongs, boats and bears!! ( sensory, fine motor)
• We worked on environmental print with our Bingo game!  The students recognized many of these signs. (i.e. stop, exit, Target, etc.)
• We read a book about our character word of the month-CARING!  We discussed what it means to be caring and how we are caring to others.  Our 2nd Steps lesson was also on caring for others.
• We matched vehicle cards and hot wheels cards as well as sorting cars.  We also traced numbers using cars. (sorting, number recognition and formation). 

Questions to Ask your Child:

1.  What is your favorite land vehicle?

2.  In the book, If I Built A Car, what did the boy build in his car? (pool, fish tank, food area, car turned into a boat, submarine, airplane)

3.  What did we do with the soapy water?  (we cleaned the cars with toothbrushes, we also played with the boats)
4.  Where would we see a license plate? (on your car)
5.  What vehicle has 2 wheels and a motor? (motorcycle)

6.  What vehicle takes students to school? (bus)

7. What did our classroom arch turn into? (car wash/a train last week) 

8. Which costs money, a school bus or a city bus?

Books we read:

If I Built a Car

Tough Trucks
Pete the Cat Go Pete Go

I Care About Others

The Litlle Blue Truck

What to practice at home:  

*Make up riddles or clues for your child to guess the right vehicle (i.e. it has 2 wheels, it goes on land, and you do all the work.  Answer:  a bike).  When driving point out different street signs and environmental signs.  We discussed some and many of the children said they have seen them before.  Also, show your children your license plate on your car.  Practice recognizing the numbers and letters.

Play red light/green light with the sign your child brought home.  You can also use it outside when they are riding bikes.

Next week: 
Gingerbread

Reminders:

PJ Day Tuesday 12/19
Winter Break 12/21-1/3  School resumes Thursday 1/4

Martin Luther King Day-No School- Monday 1/15

The pictures below show our learning objectives in action.  Enjoy the fun!

We were building our upper body strength while writing/tracing our names in the clouds!

Patterning bears!

I made a spider!

Locks and keys!

As a group, we patterned different vehicles!

We gave our letter cars a car wash! I would say the letter, sound
and a word that begins with the letter and the students then gave it a car wash
using a spray bottle! This also worked fine motor.

Our arch turned into a car wash with tickets
and scooters to build gross motor muscles!

Counting vehicles and using clothespins to find the correct number.
Practicing one to one counting and recognizing numbers.
Fine motor too using the clothespins.

We rolled the dice to park our cars on the correct numbered parking spot.

Show and Tell

Show and Tell

Show and Tell

Here is our rainbow probability race car game!

Cars, houses and ramps with different textures on them.

We traced over license plates and practiced telling
the difference between numbers and letters.

Working on making S.

We cut out and traced or copied STOP and GO.

We practiced naming environmental signs while playing bingo.

Shaving cream and monster trucks were a fan favorite!

Steering the cars!

We practiced counting and filling our trucks with rocks!

We continued our fun using boats and bears. How many bears would sink the boat.
We brought in fine motor practice using the pipettes to fill the boats.

We practiced singing our new character song, BE CARING!

Everyone enjoyed washing cars using soap and toothbrushes!

What is your favorite vehicle?

We used bears and trucks to practice positional concepts!

It was fun to play the drums in music!

Each student was a car and each student was given a turn to be the car wash!

Here the students counted the dots on the parking spaces then found the
correct numbered car and parked it in the spot!

Having fun with cars.

On Thursday, we sorted transportation pictures by land, water, 
air and tracks. We then counted and compared our columns.

We added trees and falling snow to our snow pictures in art class.

Transportation yoga!

STOP/GO game.

The students patterning trucks!