Sorting With Vehicles!

Okay, time for a little sorting fun.  Ready?  Let's go!

I'll use my Transportation Set for this little game.  Because it has sorting cards, which we need for this activity...  Here they are (laminated in all their cardstock glory :) ):

(The steering wheel you see in the pictures goes with this hide and seek game, by the way.)

Okay, so what do you do with these sorting cards?  The point is to engage the kids in playful early math and early literacy. No strict rules or right or wrong--just have fun.

One way to use them:  Put the sorting cards that represent the four types of vehicles on your board on the four corners.  Talk with the kids about what each of the cards mean.   Now place each of your vehicles in the center of the board. Ask the kids to help you figure out where to put each vehicle.  You might want them to simply call out where that vehicle goes, or you might call children up to pick a vehicle and “steer” it to the right spot.

Use your “many” and “few” cards in the same way.  Does a particular vehicle carry many or few people?  What do many and few mean?

And then of course you can combine the cards and get them thinking even harder:

Have fun sorting, you little mathematicians!

Hey, by the way...  I bet you'll like my Transportation playlist over on my YouTube channel!  

Go take a look:) 

Motor Vehicle Count Up!

Why yessirree, I do like vehicles :)  And, I love counting--counting up, counting down. It's all early math, and I love to do it in a playful way.  So today, I've got my BIG Transportation set (which you may have seen here), and I'm using it to count UP.

Motor Vehicle Count Up © Wendy Gerbi

Start with an empty board, adding your pieces at the appropriate parts of the rhyme. 

 

No motor vehicles traveling today,

No motor vehicles carrying people on their way.

Along comes a car, hear the engine roar!

Now there’s one motor vehicle, let’s go find some more!

 

(Continue adding any 4 vehicles you want, (make sure you include at least one each that drives, sails or flies) counting up until…)

Five motor vehicles traveling today, 

Five motor vehicles carrying people on their way.

They drop off the passengers, the people wave goodbye.

They’ll be back tomorrow to drive, sail and fly!

Here’s a video for you!

And in case you want to see them up close, here are a couple more photos for you :)

Happy transporting!  Happy counting!  See you next time :)

Transportation Felt Board Fun!

 

Oh, hello vehicles!  Aren't you just the most colorful things...  

I WISH driving down the freeway was this exciting in real life! 

 But hey, that's what felt boards are for, right?

So, kids do tend to love vehicles.  Trains?  Check.  Trucks? Check.  Rockets? Oh, yep.

So let's put them all together in one big set, and have some good old transportation fun, shall we?

I made up a rhyme to go along with them.  Sprinkled transportation vocab and concepts in there.  You just pile your vehicles up in the right order before you start, and then place them on the board as you name them.  Or--pass out the pieces and have the kids bring them up as you name them.  

Oh, I like that interactive way a lot!

Look at all these Vehicles! © Wendy Gerbi

Look at these vehicles that like to go, go, go!

Car, truck, and bus, they drive to and fro.

And here come some more, way up in the sky…

Plane, ‘copter, rocket—they were made to fly.

But wait, there’s more—let’s not forget the boats!

Ship, submarine, and sailboat, they all know how to float.

And finally, our rail friends: train, subway and streetcar.

Look at all these vehicles—they take us near and far!

And you know how much I love the Little Mouse game, so this set has a laminated steering wheel so we can play that game, too!  So many colors and vehicle types to name!  So much learning through play to be done!

Steering wheel, steering wheel, playing hide and seek,

Are you behind the ___________?  Let’s take a peek!

OR

Steering wheel, steering wheel, you steer us everywhere.

Are you behind the _____? Let’s check under there!

Okay, that's probably enough transportation to digest for the day.  I'll be back with more!  I've got sorting cards and more fun ways to use this set...

Space Set Tweaks :)

Well, it seems that kids know a lot more than I do.

Actually, I've known that for ages ;)  But I recently had a request for a custom space set, with the actual planets rather than my cute but quite unrealistic ones.  I was happy to oblige, and I'm so excited about the results! (In fact, you can buy this set!)

Of course I had to make up some lyrics to include a few of those new planets in my favorite space song, Zoom, Zoom, Zoom, We're Going to the Moon!

We're leaving soon,
We're going to Neptune!
We're leaving soon,
We're going to Neptune!
If you want to take a trip,
Climb aboard my rocket ship.
We're leaving soon,
We're going to Neptune, in 5..4...3...2...1...blast off!

Okay, now let's go to Venus!  Can we take a train there?  NO!  Can we take a bus there?  NOOOO!  We have to take a rocket ship!  Let's go...

No train, no bus,
Let's rocket to Venus!
No train, no bus,
Let's rocket to Venus!
If you want to take a trip,
Climb aboard my rocket ship.
No train, no bus,
Let's rocket to Venus, in 5...4...3...2...1...blast off!

I'll come up with some more lyrics to go with some of the other planets, and I'll post a video soon!   In the meantime, in case you missed it, here's a video with my other (less planet focused!) space set:

Space Song Video!

I had fun using my Space Quiet Set along with the song Zoom, Zoom, Zoom We're Going to the Moon!  (Thanks to JBrary for bringing this super fun song to my attention several years ago.  I've used it about a zillion times since then.)

Here's the set I used in this video:

And here's another post with more ideas on using this set!

T-R-A-I-N Video!

Looking for a way to build some early literacy skills through a fun and interactive song?  Especially for the little train lovers?  It's your lucky day ;) 

Not only are you introducing or reinforcing letter names in this song, but you're building musical skills as the kids keep the beat by rubbing their hands together.  You're reinforcing color concepts as you name (or have the kids name) the colors of the train cars.  There are motor and coordination skills being built as they attempt to make the 'choo' movement (and try NOT to sing the letter name!).  Plus--it's fun!

I have a bunch of other train related preschooly stuff over on my FlannelBoardFun.com blog, too.  You can check those goodies out right here:

Like what you see?  Sign up for more preschooly goodness:

Transportation Set

Thanks to custom requests, I am able to keep up with my best laid plans of frequent Flannel Friday posts!  Well, actually my plans were for every Friday, but I am now just going to have to admit that that isn't going to happen.  But better sometimes than never...  

This set is intended to go along with a Barefoot Book called We All Go Traveling By, but it can be used in lots of ways.  

Conversation starters, for instance:  "I have something hiding in this box that has LOTS of wheels, and can carry lots of people, or freight...  Does anyone have an idea of what it could be?"  "Ok, the next thing in my box has NO wheels, but it can still carry people from place to place...What could it be?"

Do you have other ideas of how to use this set?  Leave them in the comments below!

Sign up for my newsletter if you'd like more ideas on all things preschool!

And don't forget to check out Flannel Friday's Pinterest Boards and Tumbler Page for a zillion flannel board ideas!

The Wheels on the Bus

A  friend has her son enrolled in a new, very small family child care center, and wanted to give the teacher a few flannel board sets to get her collection started.  The Wheels on the Bus was one of her requests, and here are the results:

( I have lots of sets available for sale in my shop:   Check them out :) )

I always like to mix things up, so once I wear out the traditional verses of this song, we sing about animals on the bus, using animals from Old MacDonald or finger puppets. Or sometimes I like to put a few chairs in a row and let the kids come up and pretend to be the various animals or people we are singing about--lots of fun!

Jessica is hosting the roundup this week.  You can also find tons of ideas at Flannel Friday's Pinterest Pages, the Flannel Friday Blog, and Flannel Friday's Facebook page.