Play Based Learning Goals

In our class, we focus on specific play skills so that our students will have successful play interactions with their peers and those they may play with during integration opportunities. In order to keep track of what we are working on we created the following chart. The first box of the chart shows what specific play activities we are targeting. The second box indicates what specific language we are targeting at each area. The third box is the targeted play for our water/sand/sensory table. Our special education team has been really supporting this effort by creating picture symbols for the targeted vocabulary.

The year at a glance

October goals

DIY Sensory Bag



 

We made this sensory bag using four easy to find items. We got a heavy duty Ziploc bag from our stock order (TDSB stock catalogue) and added 2 bottles of coloured hair gel from Dollarama, and a whole bunch of sparkles. We then taped all the way around on the seams with packing tape. The students have been enjoying using this on the light table (as seen below), drawing shapes, tracing letters, and making hand prints.

 

 

Door Knob

One of our students is very interested in how things work. He is especially interested in the class door latch mechanism. In order to stop him from investigating its mechanics and opening the door throughout the day, which is a safety risk with other friends, I built him his own knob. Our classroom has an accessible handle rather than a turn-knob, but I am hoping he will be just as interested in this one as the real one.

Sensory Combination

Our students have been big fans of the multi-coloured rice bin for sensory play. A fellow teacher added a picture of students using a sandbox on the light table (thanks Pinterest), so today we placed our rice bin on the light table. The students really enjoyed the added sensory input of the light shining through rice.

Creating swirls in the rice. This made for a really interesting video as well.

3D Wooden Puzzle Tower

Last week I was looking through some of the vendor catalogues for some new materials for my class. I found an interesting puzzle tower but it was more than $50. I decided I could make a similar toy for much cheaper. After a Home Depot run I spent a couple hours building it in my dad's workshop. I left the wood unfinished as it fits more with our school's natural materials philosophy. I bought enough wood to make two, so the grand total for one of the puzzles was only about $10.

How to Make Multi-Coloured Rice for Sensory Play

Here is the instructions for making the multi-coloured rice that we use:

1. Put one cup of rice in a medium sized bowl

2. Add a couple tablespoons of water

3. Add a few drops of food colouring (whatever colours you want), the more food colouring you add the deeper the colour

4. Stir until blended and it is the colour you want.

5. Spread on a baking sheet to dry

6. Occasionally stir the rice around to ensure all the rice dries

7. Repeat until you have as much rice as you want

8. Store in an air-tight container

9. Take to school and enjoy

Fine Motor Activity for Outdoor Snow Play

Today we went outside to explore the winter wonderland. We added food colouring and water to Dollarama spray bottles to "paint" with. Squeezing the triggers on the spray bottles is a great way to develop fine motor control. The students really enjoyed "painting" the snow.

Simple tricks for puzzles

Here are a couple simple tricks to use when accommodating students who are working on puzzles.

Using a three inch binder to raise the puzzle so the student can see the top of the puzzle easier.

 

Mixing the pieces from two puzzles together to add a challenge to put in puzzles

for students for whom put in puzzles are too easy.

 



Hands on Fun at the Water Table

This week we built a new hands-on activity at our water table. The goal was to have the students use squeeze materials (turkey basters, squeeze bottles) to help develop their fine motor control. We used wire cube shelving pieces, tubes, and funnels to develop the activity. The students were extremely excited about trying it out. It has been a huge success and students who have previously shown limited attention at activities have stayed and played for more than 40 minutes. We ended up adding blue food colouring so it was easier for the students to see the water moving in the tubes. The wire shelving and tubing were purchased at Home Depot, and the funnels, turkey basters and squeeze bottle were purchased at Dollarama.

All set up.

Learning to use the turkey basters to squeeze water into the tubes

 

 

With blue food colouring added. Working together to fill the container at the bottom!

Experimenting with squeeze bottles.