Tag Archives: safari

Jan24

Let’s Go On An Adventure

Posted on January 24, 2020 by jd785

Our theme this week is a really fun one. The book features students dressed for a variety of adventures so be sure to check it out. The sensory groups explored boxes related to the different scenarios depicted in the book. The fine motor groups crafted some fun art projects and the language group went on an adventure!

SENSORY GROUP

With bright stars, planets, and a rocket ship, our outer space umbrella really let the students feel like they were in space!

Very eye catching!

Science access point: recognize a space related object.

Joining the circus would be big adventure—-even more fun if you could be a clown!

Wood shavings formed the base of this box and a rake to move them around to discover a clown picture at the bottom.

Science access point: apply a push to move an object.

Colorful dinosaurs of different sizes roamed around in dinosaur eggs (turquoise beans).

The students loved the feel of the beans running through their fingers

Math access point: recognize similarities and differences in size of objects.

The students searched for buried pirate treasure in black kinetic sand.

There were lots of coins to count!

Math access point: associate quantities with number names.

There were lots of Safari themed items including a jeep, camera, compass, binoculars, and jungle animals to find and discover in this box.

We also included a voice output device with recordings of jungle animal sounds.

Our students TOTALLY rocked the sunglasses!

Science access point: recognize a model of a real object.

A toy Superman flew around shaving cream clouds in our messy play.

Soft and fluffy——- so much fun!

Science access point: recognize that pushing and pulling makes an object move.

Hands were rinsed in a small mermaid lagoon!

We also included a funnel and measuring cups for scooping fun.

Math access point: recognize differences in sizes of containers that hold liquids.

Bath and Body Works ocean scent helped the students remember all the fun they had today.

Whether applied to arms, necks, or behind ears—-the students really loved the aroma!

Science access point: recognize one or more external body parts.

FINE MOTOR GROUP

On Tuesday, the students made super hero pictures using this template: super hero

First, the students identified the shape and color of our base paper.

Math access point: recognize objects with two-dimensional shapes.

Science access point: identify objects by one observable property, such as color.

Then, using tabletop or switch operated scissors, the students cut “buildings” from paper strips.

Science access point: recognize a change in the appearance of object.

These pieces were glued down on to the base paper to make buildings.

Math access point: solve problems involving small quantities of objects or actions using language, such as enough, too much, or more.

Next, they added a superhero to the scene.

Science access point: recognize when an object is added to a situation.

TA DA!!! It’s a bird, it’s a plane,…………

…………..it’s a SUPERHERO!!!!!

On Wednesday the students became Mer-people 🙂

First, they identified our paint colors. We used regular paint and some colorful glitter glue (thank you Ms. Judy!)

Science access point: identify objects by one observable property, such as color.

Then, they used kitchen sponges covered with bubble wrap to stamp fish scales on giant tails! We reminded the students to stamp DOWN and UP.

Math access point: recognize a movement that reflects a spatial relationship, such as up and down.

TA DA!!!

Say hello to our Mermaids and Mermen 🙂

Let’s go on an ocean adventure!!!!

LANGUAGE GROUP

We went on our own adventure this week during the language group. It was snow day at our school, so our language group had to figure out challenges in order to get to the snow.

We used these challenges on the way: Adventure Challenges

Our students were stopped several times and had to answer questions about the different adventures that were in our book. They had a visual prompt to help them out. For instance, the first question was “what does a knight ride on? A horse or an elephant”.

If students had difficulty answering the question, they had to request HELP.

Finally, we made it to the snow! Students got to feel the snow.

They had to indicate if it was COLD or HOT.

They also got to choose whether they wanted to ride on a sled or an inner tube to get down the hill.

Once they were at the bottom, they indicated whether they LIKED it or did NOT LIKE it.

It was a really fun adventure!

Join us again next time for more fun and learning—–Group by Group!

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Sep7

Let’s Go On A Safari book

Posted on September 7, 2019 by jd785

Let’s Go On A Safari book

The theme for our school this year is “the jungle” so we decided to take a little safari and see what kinds of animals we could find. We had lots of help from students as they dressed up as the animals. We saw zebras, giraffes, and even some butterflies.

Take a look at the book to see all of the animals on our safari!

Here is a link to the book: Let’s Go On A Safari

Sep6

Let’s Go On A Safari

Posted on September 6, 2019 by jd785

Let’s Go On A Safari

We are going on safari—-it is our school wide theme this year! The sensory groups explored animal themed boxes and the fine motor groups made animal themed art projects. The language group made a tasty animal themed treat!

SENSORY GROUP

This box contained safari themed items such as a toy camera, hat, sunglasses, jeep, compass, and a variety of toy animals.

Of course, the students had fun trying on the props 🙂

Science access point: recognize a model of a real object.

Our bright colorful “tiger” rice was very eye catching. It might just be our favorite!

There were 3 camouflaged tigers to find in the rice!

Math access point: associate quantities with number names.

There were lots of animals, including monkeys, butterflies, lizards, bees, and bird to find in our jungle themed umbrella.

We also included a sloth hand puppet and a voice output with jungle sounds.

Science access point: recognize and respond to different types of sensory stimuli.

Yellow and brown pom pom’s filled this giraffe themed box.

Whether just feeling their soft texture or sorting by color, the students really enjoyed this.

Science access point: match objects with similar observable properties such as color.

More eye catching colors could be found in our butterfly and caterpillar pasta box.

There were a variety of other butterflies to find.

Math access point: recognize similarities and differences in size of common objects.

The students mixed yellow food coloring with shaving cream to make a fluffy mane for the laminated lion in our messy play.

Our lion ended up with some pretty wild hair 🙂

Science access point: recognize that pushing or pulling an object makes it move.

Hands were rinsed in a little lake containing a crocodile and hippo.

Two different sized measuring cups were included for scooping fun.

Science access point: match living things with their habitats.

We are using up the last of our banana scented lotion with this unit. PLEASE start stocking it again World Market 🙂

Whether placed on hands, arms, neck, or behind ears, this lotion was a hit!

Science access point: recognize one or more external body parts.

FINE MOTOR GROUP

On Tuesday the students made paper bag zebras.

First, they identified the paint color.

Science access point: identify an object by one observable property, such as color.

Next, they used a fun patterned roller to add stripes to their zebras.

Science access point: apply a push to move an object.

Then, they added a nose, ears, eyes, and a cool mohawk cut from scrap paper.

Math access point: recognize when an object is added to a situation.

TA DA!!

Some zany zebras!

Quick—–take a picture!!!

On Wednesday we made sunset safari pictures.

First, the students identified the paint color.

Science access point: identify an object by one observable property, such as color.

Next, the students tore pieces of colorful tissue paper. The students really had fun with this part 🙂

Science access point: recognize a change in an object.

Then, they used paint brushes to spread glue over the yellow background paper and patted down strips of tissue paper on to the glue.

Math access point: recognize when an object is added to a situation.

Elephants were added by stamping UP and DOWN.

Math access point: recognize a movement that reflects a spatial relationship, such as up and down.

TA— trumpety trump— DA!!

We saw a herd of elephants.

What fabulous safari pictures!

LANGUAGE GROUP

We made a yummy safari treat this week in our language group. Here is the recipe that we used: Let’s Make A Zebra Striped Parfait Disclaimer: we changed it a little bit by using 2 boxes of mix rather than 1 and using 3 cups of milk instead of 2 due to the amount of kiddos we had.

We started out by PUTTING white chocolate pudding mix into a bowl. Students who said they would HELP were given the pudding mix box. We waited for a few seconds while the students tried to open the boxes. After they were unable to open the boxes themselves, they were prompted to ask for HELP from staff.

Once the boxes were open, the mix was poured into the bowl.

Next, each student got to touch the milk. They indicated whether it felt COLD or HOT.

Science access point: recognize objects or materials as warm or cold.

Since we used 3 cups, 2 DIFFERENT students got to HELP. We first measured out 2 cups. The students were then asked how many MORE cups we needed to add.

Math access point: solve problems involving small quantities of objects or actions using language, such as enough, too much, or more.

Once the pudding mix and milk were in the bowl, each student got to HELP mix it up.

After each student, we LOOKED at the bowl to see if the pudding was ALL DONE or if we needed to mix it MORE.

When the pudding was ALL DONE, we set it aside. Each student got a bag with 3 Oreo cookies. Students had to make sure they each had the correct amount. Then, they got to SMASH their cookies into pieces.

We used an ice cream scoop as a hammer and it worked perfectly!

Math access point: associate quantities with number names.

Each student had to indicate that they WANTED some pudding in their CUP. Then, they each added HALF of the Oreos and repeated the pudding and Oreos again.

TaDa! A yummy zebra striped treat 🙂

Hope you enjoyed the safari! Join us next time for more fun and learning—–Group by Group!

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Apr28

Safari book

Posted on April 28, 2013 by jd785

Safari book

We are taking the students on a safari this week. The pictures in the book are special ones as they were taken by my sister when she was on a real African safari! Thank you, Katie, for sharing your pictures with us! The students appeared to enjoy looking at what all of the different animals were doing in the pictures. Some of our students named the animals along with us. We asked the question “where are we going?” to which the repetitive line answered, “we are going on a safari”. The last page in the book is my personal favorite because it’s an animal looking right at us! Check out the book to find out which animal it is.

Here is a link to the book: We Are Going on a Safari

Apr28

Safari

Posted on April 28, 2013 by jd785

Safari

Our groups went on Safari this week! Cara’s sister, who lives in Africa, sent us her actual safari pictures for our book—-how cool is that!

Sensory Group

If you are going on safari you are probably going to have to ride on an airplane to get there and when you ride on an airplane you can hear engine sounds and feel the engine vibrate.

Our vibrating tube gave us those same sensations. The tube is bendable and soft—-nice to cuddle with or wrap around your neck!

Our students loved it!

This addresses the science access point of recognizing and responding to one type of sensory stimuli.

When you are on safari you want to SEE the animals, not have them see you—-that’s why you might want to wear camo clothing!

We mixed brown, green, red and white dried beans and peas to make our camo box. It turned out pretty cool! Beans are always popular with our students, they particularly like burying and uncovering things in them. This week we put in a large letter S for “safari” for them to find.

2 different sized scoops were also included to add to the fun.

This activity helps build tactile discrimination and visual figure ground skills. It also addresses the math access point of recognizing differences in the sizes of containers.

It is especially fun if you are also wearing a camo hat 🙂

Our jungle box was filled with green shredded paper, raffia, chenille yarn vines, and green silk leaves. We put in a globe, wooden sun cut out, a little jeep, a variety of toy zoo animals you might see on safari and an old camera—-perfect for taking pictures of all those cool animals.

So much to talk about and vocabulary to learn!

Speaking of animals, some of them had buttons that when pushed made the animals growl. We have used these before and they are always very popular—-great for promoting finger individuation!

For our students who have significant physical disabilities—its always great to have a friend help you out 🙂

This activity addresses the language access point of responding to new vocabulary that is introduced and taught directly.

It also addresses the science access point of recognizing and responding to common sounds AND the science access point of sharing objects with a partner—-so sweet!

Our tiger pom poms are so bright and so very eye catching. Different colors and sizes—perfect for comparing and contrasting!

Lots of access points can be addressed with these colorful spheres including the science access point of recognizing 2 objects that are identical to each other …..and the math access points recognizing a common 3 dimensional objects and recognizing similarities and differences in the size of objects.

Is this a great box or what!!!!!

Colorful feathered birds are always a part of any safari! This box contained a variety of feather boas—-perfect for wrapping around you or shaking—-so soft and fluffy! We got these at the dollar store around halloween and totally got our money’s worth of fun out of them 🙂

The science access point of identifying common objects by one observable property—in this case color.

Uh oh—-beware of quick sand!!!!!

We added water to some cornmeal mix to make our quick sand and were pretty happy with the results.

As you can tell by our students expressions, this was some weird feeling concoction but they couldn’t resist sticking their hands right back in again and again—trying to figure it out—what inquisitive little scientists we have!

This activity addresses the science access point of exploring, observing and recognizing objects in the natural world.

The language access point of using body movement or nonverbal expressions to communicate preferences—-NAILED 🙂

We finished by rinsing our hands using Into the Wild by Bath and Body Works scented water—it had a really nice aroma but we suspect nothing like what the “wild” actually smells like ha ha.

Banana scented lotion that we found at World Market was the perfect finishing touch to help us remember our safari fun!

This activity addresses the science access points of recognizing one way people use water and recognizing and responding to one type of sensory stimuli.

Fine Motor Group

On Tuesday for our art activity we made tiger masks!

We started by cutting, using our adaptive scissors, 3 strips of paper in half—to make 6 tiger stripes.

Cutting the paper addresses the science access point of recognizing a change in an object.

The stripes were glued onto our tiger mask. Prior to the activity, staff cut out eye holes in an orange paper plate (found on clearance after halloween—-score!) and glued a paint stick to the back. As we passed the masks out, we discussed their circular shape, of course 🙂

We asked the students to touch their noses and then gave them 1 black triangle nose to glue onto their masks. Then 2 orange ears were glued onto the head.

Eye hand coordination and spatial relations are addressed with this activity. Lots of math access points are addressed including recognizing common objects with 2 dimensional shapes and associating quantities with number names.

The science access point of recognizing one or more external body parts was also addressed.

Better watch out for tigers—-

GRRRRRR!!!!

On Thursday we read Cara’s book again, practicing passing the voice output to our neighbor for their turn. This addresses the science access point of sharing objects with a partner. For our art project, we continued our safari theme by making some monkey puppets.

First we passed 1 large brown circle to each student. They used our paper cutters to cut them in half—making semi circles!

These were then glued onto a paper lunch bag.

This activity addresses the science access point of recognizing a change in an object. It also addresses the math access points of recognizing a 2 dimensional shape and recognizing parts of whole objects.

Of course, it also promotes eye hand coordination and spatial relations.

We used our large hole punch to cut 2 brown circles for our monkey ears, which were glued to the top of the bag.

Then the finishing touch—2 big googlie eyes!

This activity addresses the science access point of recognizing a change in an object (as the circles are punched) and recognizing external body parts.

It also addresses math access points including matching one object to a designated space to show one to one correspondence and associating quantities 1 and 2 with number names.

Putting on those little googlie eyes also gives our students an opportunity to practice their pincer grasp skills.

Ta Da—-what cute little monkey puppets!

Language Group

We started out this week with Cara’s book. Although reading the book is new to this group, our students have been doing an EXCELLENT job of pressing the voice output device and sharing it with their friends.

As we read the book and use the voice output device (in all our groups) we address the language access point of listening for informative purposes (ex. following prompts, cues).

The book led us into our own safari. We put 7 different animals (a combination of plush and plastic ones) on the table. We asked the students to use their binoculars to find the different animals—-while wearing a super cool safari hat!

This activity addresses the science access point of recognizing a familiar objects enlarged by magnification.

It also addresses the language access point of responding to new vocabulary that is introduced and taught directly.

After finding an animal, they had to match the animal up with a picture symbol of the animal. We used the carrier phrase “I see a ___” so the students could fill in the blank with the animal that they had seen. We used the PIXON communication board symbols for “I” and “see” to work on identifying different PIXON picture symbols.

This addresses the language access point of communicating about a selected object using pictures/symbols/words.

Pretty cool!

With our safari over, it was feeding time to feed the monkeys 🙂

We gave each student 3 bananas and counted as they were put into the monkey’s mouth one at a time—physically assisting our students as needed.

The activity promotes grasp skills and eye hand coordination.

In addition the math access points of recognizing when an object is added to a situation and recognizing quantities 1 to 3 using sets of objects.

What a great week, we had so much fun going on safari! Join us again next week—-we promise to bring lots to discover plus smiles, fun and learning—-Group by Group!