Spring Fun

Spring brings lots of exciting events both in school and in the community. This made for a really fun theme this week! Our sensory groups explored boxes related to different events. The fine motor groups made decorations for the biggest spring event—–graduation! The language group led a fantastic spring parade and then had a party, with sweet treats 🙂

SENSORY GROUP

Spring break often means BEACH time around here! We put a little shovel and a measuring scoop in our play sand. The students had fun making sandcastles and finding shells in it.

Since the sandcastles could be counted, the math access point associate quantities with number names can be addressed here.

The Rough Riders visit our school the day before the city’s Springtime parade. Not only do they wear cool costumes but they pass out beads and teddy bears to all the students—-how cool is that! There were some HARD beads and a SOFT teddy bear for the students to explore in this box.

Match objects with similar observable properties, such as size, shape, color, or texture is a science access point.

The FSU marching chiefs visit is another spring highlight for our school. We filled this FSU box with shaker pompoms, beads, garland etc. all in the school’s colors. We also included a toy saxophone which was a big hit with the students!

Recognize a model of a real object is a science access point.

The school talent show is always so much fun—-we have some pretty talented students and staff! To help get our students in the show biz spirit, we put in a variety of costume props but the feather boa and glasses were the hits here!

While trying on the props, the students can identify one or more external body parts—-a science access point.

Graduation is THE event in spring. This box contained rice in our school colors along with our school initials. There was also a picture of our soon to be graduates at the bottom of the box. Lots of opportunities for visual and tactile discrimination in this box!

The science access point apply a push to move an object can be addressed here.

Memorial Day brings about the end of school and the beginning of summer. We put blue and red glitter to make our patriotic oobleck. The swirling glitter looked pretty cool!

Track objects in motion is a science access point.

Our students love participating in all of the sports activities in Special Olympics and SportsAbility events. We put our paddle wheel toy in our water play as a nod to the ever popular paddle boat ride at SportsAbility. As usual, lots of splashy fun here!

The science access point recognize that when an activity is repeated, it has the same result, can be addressed here.

A lot of our spring events happen outside and outside events mean sunscreen! we went with coconut scented bath gel and body lotion this week. Coconut is a pretty strong scent, leaving the students smelling like a day at the beach!

Recognize one or more external body parts is a science access point.

FINE MOTOR GROUP

On Tuesday the students made a garland to decorate the graduation festivities. We used craft foam stars purchased at the dollar store.

First the students used communication symbols to identify the color of the stars.

Identify objects by one observable property, such as color, is a science access point.

Then they squeezed glue onto the stars and added either a letter or number to their star—-either our school initials or 2-0-1-7!

Since they had to put these DOWN onto their stars, the math access point recognize a movement that reflects a spatial relationship is addressed.

Next the students added some sparkly blue glitter!

Recognize a change in an object is a science access point.

The students practiced their pincer grasp skills as they threaded some yarn through holes in the tops of the stars.

Recognize pushing and pulling an object makes it move, is a science access point.

TA Da!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Congratulations class of 2017!

On Wednesday the students made decorations that highlighted each of our seniors. This time we used starts cut from yellow poster board.

First the students counted out 3 craft foam star stickers.

Associate quantities with number names is a math access point.

Peeling the backs off the stickers was a great opportunity to work on pincer grasp skills. They had to put their LITTLE stars onto their BIG star.

Recognize differences in size of objects is a math access point.

Then they added a picture of one of the graduates to their stars.

Recognize when 1 item has been added to sets of objects to 3, is a math access point.

To finish, the students pulled some shiny curling ribbon through a hole in the top of their stars.

The science access point recognize pushing and pulling and object makes it move is addressed here.

TA DA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

We love our seniors!!!!

LANGUAGE GROUP

We had such a great time celebrating spring this week during our language group! During the spring, we have a spring parade here in town, so we decided to mimic it with our OWN spring parade.

The language group dressed up in hats, tutus, and beads and we made our own parade floats using poster board that we attached to the front of the students in wheelchairs.

We had a special bubble blowing Grand Marshall, who was here for “Take your Child to work Day”, to lead the parade!

While we paraded through the elementary building, we handed out beads and bears to the parade goers.

Lots of fun and excitement!

Everybody LOVED their teddy bears!

They were a hit!

Once we made it through the parade route it was time for refreshments and socialization.

Each student had to use the symbol sentence strips provided in order to request what they wanted. There were different sentence strips for each of the items: ice cream, chocolate sauce, sprinkles, and punch. Our students had to indicate “I want ___” in order to receive the food/drink items.