Tot School-Transportation

This week we are focusing on transportation.  We're taking a day each and talking about airplanes, trains, boats and even a hot air balloon!  Mara has been obsessed with trains lately so I thought she would have fun this week.  Plus we own a bunch of great Usborne books on all these topics which just happen to be her current favorites on the bookshelf!

Monday we didn't get to do any tot school as Josh had off and we went out of town.

Tuesday I tried to make up for our off day by doing three activities.  Unlike weeks before, I decided to combine all the activities into one focused time.  This week we tried to do it in the afternoons after nap time (and during Madeline's nap) and I can honestly say I love this approach better.  Mara seems more engaged and focused.

Our first activity was a Popsicle stick airplane craft.  We read our Usborne book, "Look Inside the Airport" and then created our scene.  We glued the sticks to look like airplanes and pulled apart some cotton balls to make clouds.  Mara did a great job with the glue.  I am just now letting her try to squeeze it on her own and she does a decent job.  She is still much better with a glue stick so we try to stick to that when possible.

Construction was another focus of the week.  Although we did a whole week on this topic I wanted to revisit it in transportation week.  I had a left over do a dot so I pulled it out and let her go for it.  Again she is getting so much better with this to the extent that she gets really frustrated if it's not perfect.  I'm wondering if that's a sign she needs something more challenging or a sign I should keep giving them to her? While she did this activity we read yet another Usborne book, "Construction site".  This book has some great pictures and flaps to explore!

Our last activity of the day was a road I made out of tape on the ground.  I simply took masking tape and put it on the dinning room floor to make a road.  I set out three of her favorite cars on it and let her have some sensory play.  I loved that she didn't get down on the floor with her cars but moved them all aside and drove on the road herself with her radio flyer.  She also loves just "walking" the road and when daddy came home he showed her how to walk heel to toe.

Wednesday we did three more activities again.  Today was supposed to be focused on trains but I threw in a hot air balloon craft for the fun of it.  I did something similar to our bats and asked her to "paint" a coffee filter with her do a dots.  Then we used water to create a watercolor affect.  We let it dry overnight and revisited it the next day.

Then it was onto trains.  We used "Fingerprint Activities" to make a fingerprint train.  Mara was somewhat curious about this but HATED getting her finger dirty.  I had to have a wet paper towel nearby at all times so she could clean her fingers.  We did manage to get a few fingerprints from her before it was too much.   Funny thing was after a few minutes she wanted to do it again so we flipped through the book and found a page where you can use your fingerprints to make people in cars.  We made a few before it was time to wash hands again lol.

Our last activity of the day was a name train.  I printed out a train and then cut cars out to go behind it.  On the cars I spelled out her name.  She's getting pretty good at letter recognition but I really wanted to focus on her name.  I then cut out wheels that had corresponding letters and asked her to put the wheels on the train.  With each wheel we named the letter and then she found the same letter on the train cars.  When we were done we spelled it out and talked about how it was her name.

Thursday we talked all about boats.  Mara LOVES the song "Row, row, row your boat" so I thought she would be really into this sub-theme.  We started with a simple rowing game.  We sat on the ground and sang the nursery rhyme while swinging back and forth.  This was mainly for fun but also helps her with her balance and gross motor skills.  One of my goals in the new year with tot school is to incorporate more physical activities like this!

Then it was on to some sorting.  I found a printable online and had her sort the different transportation vehicles that were in the air versus on the water.  She did this pretty well but got board of it quickly.  I fell behind when preparing this and I think that's why she wasn't as interested.  If I would have gotten it set up earlier while she was napping it probably would have gone over better.

Our tot school ended that night with a sensory bath.  I had planned on doing a sensory bin but couldn't think of a big enough tote that I could put water in so I switched things up and just did it during bath time.  At first she hated my ice boats screaming and throwing them BUT as soon as they melted she wanted more.  Toddlers.....SO I think we'll try this again at bath time tomorrow.

On Friday we were ending with cars.  Our first project was some car drawing.  I simply attached markers to the back of some of her wheeled vehicles and let her "draw".  Well after the massive breakdown she did this for about 30 seconds all while yelling, "Choo choo." Semi-success?

Our next project was a craft.  I wanted to make cars out of toilet paper tubes.  I prepped this all the night before making "tires" out of cardboard and cutting slots in the tubes for windshields.  Then I gave Mara the markers and let her decorate her cars.  When she was done we put the tires on and played with them on her masking tape track.

The last project of the day just happened as I was straightening up my Usborne bookcase (yes I have a whole bookcase dedicated to it).  Mara saw a train sticker book and just HAD to do it.  I gave in and we  sat down with the book.  The best part of these books is she is super engaged forever.  We did almost the entire book over the course of an hour.

Next week we are focused on Art.  Again we'll be doing a lot of of craft projects and a few activities.  I'm looking forward to breaking out two of our new Usborne books again and seeing how Mara does with them.