Great Website for Cause-and-Effect

Staff from Holland Bloorview introduced me to a great website called HelpKidzLearn. I have been using the free trial with my students on the Interactive White Board. There are several activities that are touch activated and can be used with a single clicker mouse (I will post instructions on how to turn your mouse into a single clicker soon) or a switch-activator button. My students are really enjoying the stories "5 Little Firefighter" (this has become the most requested activity on the board - surpassing ever the Wiggles Big Red Car video), and "Car Wash" and the early years game "Mystery Egg". Check out the link to the site below.

HelpKidzLearn

Quick Matching Activity

One of my students in a big fan of Thomas the Train. Using Boardmaker and Google Images, I created a quick matching activity for him to work on.

I apologize for this not being rotated, I have saved it numerous times
in the right orientation but it keeps uploading like this

Scent Jars for Sensory

Today I made six scent jars. This is a really inexpensive way to meet the sensory needs of some of our students. I got a six pack of small plastic jars at Dollarama ($3.50) The lids were very thin and I easily poked two holes in them with a small screwdriver. I asked the other teachers in my schools if they had any extracts at home I could borrow. My co-workers came through well and I only had to buy cinnamon sticks ($1.50). So I made these for around $5.

The scents I used were:

• Cinnamon sticks
• Vanilla extract
• Orange extract
• Lemon extract
• Imitation coconut
• Imitation maple

We placed a few drops on cotton balls and placed them in containers.

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.

We All Go Traveling By

My students have really been enjoying the book We All Go Traveling By by Sheena Roberts. Each page has a different method of travel in a different colour and a specific noise. I made an activity where after reading the story my students identify the colour of the specific object from three choices.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sorting Activity

This week I hosted other DK teachers who have Interactive White Boards. They came to watch my students use the board. Here is the sorting activity that we created as part of this observation.

 

 

In the activity students pull out various pictures of hats and jackets that are hidden behind the blue rectangle. We used a variety of actual pictures and clip art drawings to challenge the students more. We also included a verbal prompt (as indicated by the speaker icon).