Skip to main content

TransportationTheme

There are often children in the class that are interested in trains or planes or boats. When that happens, we have a transportation theme at some point during the year. The Dramatic Play Center can be turned into a ticket office where the children purchase tickets for the train, plane or boat. Vehicles can be added to the Block Center. In the Science and Math Centers, ramps can be set up for the cars to race down and the children can experiment to see which is faster and measure which goes the farthest. Cars can be marked with letters or numerals and a parking lot can be marked with matching letters or numerals. Students drive and park the cars in the correct parking spot.The Reading Center can contain some of these books:
*"Freight Train"
*"The Blue Truck"
*"Don't Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus"
*"My Truck is Stuck"
*"I'm Fast"
*"I'm Dirty"
*"The Wheels on the Bus"
*"The Little Engine that Could"
*"Row Row Row Your Boat"
*"Roaring Rockets"
Word cards for vehicles can be placed at the Writing Center. Letters or numerals can also be taped on the ground and students can drive around them, staying on the tape. In the Fine Motor/Sensory Center, I place three plastic tubs for sorting transportation. One tub has black beans (land). One tub has blue water beads (water). The last tub has cotton balls (sky). I also place a box of transportation counters for the children to play with and sort in the tubs. The Art Center can have a couple of options. Children can create name trains where they glue an engine on the left of their paper and then one train car for every letter in their name. Each letter should be written on the cars and then they should be glued in order behind the engine. Wheels and a smoke stack can be added along with a train track. Another option that is much more open-ended includes laying out several colors of paint on paper plates and allowing the children to drive a vehicle through the paint and then drive it onto the paper creating tracks. Gross Motor Play can include using a large appliance box as a vehicle, crawling through "train" tunnels and pretending to be airplanes by flying across the room and then landing at an airport (marked area of the room). There are so many ways to get students involved and keep them engaged in a transportation unit.











Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Pumpkin Theme

 Every October we learn about pumpkins. Mini pumpkins are brought into the Science Center for every child and we investigate them with magnifying lenses and our senses. We also cut the top off of a large pumpkin and scoop the seeds out to investigate as well.  I allow every child who is interested, a turn scooping seeds out. I never require the students to help if they are not interested.  In the Literacy Center, we use mini pumpkin erasers to trace around letters. Pumpkin stickers can also be used.  We take a field trip to a local pumpkin patch where every child is allowed to pick a pumpkin to take home.  In the Fine Motor/Sensory Center, we make pumpkin pie with orange playdough and rolling pins.  We also count and make patterns in the Math Center with pumpkin erasers or manipulatives. In the Pumpkin STEAM box, I include mini pumpkins, leaves, acorns, magnifying lenses and orange slices of pool noodles that the children can play and e...

Back to School

 The first week of school each year, I spend a lot of time practicing routines with my students. I make it a goal of mine to make every child in my class feel loved and safe so those first few weeks are so important in setting the atmosphere. I introduce one or two centers a day until all of the centers are open and running smoothly. I take pictures of areas around our classroom and make routine books that we read and reread throughout the first couple of weeks. I create Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, Math boxes that I place at our Science Center,  along with magnifying lenses and a scale. The STEAM boxes match whatever theme we are covering.  I separate our blocks by color and store them in matching colored boxes so that children are easily able to replace the blocks when they are done playing. These are stored in our Block Center.  I label our toy cubbies with pictures so that children know where each toy is stored and they are easily able to find ...

All About Me/Feelings Themes

The first week of school, we spend practicing our routine and getting comfortable with coming to school.  The next couple of weeks, we spend getting to know ourselves and each other. We do an All About Me Theme followed by a Feelings Theme.  We create cutouts of ourselves and display them to show our differences and connectedness. I love how each cutout looks different.  We talk a lot about how we are each special and unique. We compare eye colors and hair colors. We talk about our families and who is in each family. We draw pictures of ourselves and our families including any pets we have. We do name activities where we count how many letters are in our names and then we use letter tiles to make our names.  We compare each child's name to the other names in the class and look at beginning letters and syllables.  We also graph some of our favorites, such as colors, animals, foods, or sports. We draw pictures of our friends and copy our friends' names....