This week our themes were Red, White and Blue for our sensory group, Symbols of our Country for the fine motor group. We chose these themes to follow the Unique Curriculum, which our county uses. The topic for this month is government. In our alphabet group, we are on letter C.
Sensory Group—Red, White and Blue
We read Cara’s book “Symbols of Our Country” and talked about who was wearing red, white or blue shirts. Then the students voted on what color to make the oobleck.
We like to give our students choices of 3 items because when they take our Alternate Assessment they are given an array of 3 choices.
We counted how many votes each color received. Then we talked about which color got the most votes. Dani, one of our teachers, suggested that we use cold water for blue oobleck and warm water for red oobleck so that we were also addressing one of the science access points regarding temperature.
We made the oobleck (one of our all time favorite substances) by adding water to cornstarch and adding koolaid for color. If you are wondering why our oobleck doesn’t match our vote tally its because we actually do our sensory group in 4 different classrooms during the week and ended up with pictures from different groups.
We rinsed our hands in cherry scented water and used cherry scented lotion as we talked about cherry pie as a symbol of our country. We would have preferred to use rose scents, as our book discussed the rose as a symbol of our country, but were unable to locate some in time for our group. We have learned to be flexible !
We searched for the letters USA in rice. Joy added a couple of teaspoons of rubbing alcohol, some drops of food coloring and a cup of rice into a ziplock bag. She mixed the ingredients then sprinkled them out onto a paper towel to dry, which took less than 1 hour. Repeat for each desired color. It was a nice effect and we had some students who rarely engage become very participatory with the rice.
And finally, we explored the concepts of hard and soft (a properties of materials access point) in addition to colors using mardi gras beads and pom poms. This box was a real hit with our students!
Fine Motor Group—-USA
We read Cara’s book Symbols of our Country and Jeannie brought out an american flag that the students were able to look at and touch. We then proceeded to make our own flags. First we handed out a sheet of white paper. We talked about its color (white) and shape (rectangle).
We then cut red strips using a paper cutter and then counted how many we had cut.
We then cut out some blue rectangles. Many of our students used our adaptive table top scissors to do this. Again, we discussed what shape we were cutting.
We assembled our flag placing our red strips in an “across” manner (visual copy/prewriting skill) and putting our blue rectangle at the top. This was finished off with some star stickers. We discussed the shape as a math access point. Peeling of the stickers was great for facilitating a pincer grasp. We always have the students hold up their finished product while the table gives them a big “Ta-Da” and this student was especially proud and excited about his work which he was able to complete with very little assistance.
On Thursday we continued our theme by making Uncle Sam beards after reading Cara’s book again. For the beard we used a triangle shape and cotton balls. We learned about shapes and the concept of soft. We also talked about the colors red, white, and blue.
We started with a precut triangle with a slightly concave top. The students then glued on cotton balls.
We counted how many cotton balls were on the beard and also reviewed the concepts of hard and soft. We then put chenille stems through the holes, working on eye hand coordination.
We used the chenille stems to hook the beard around our ears. We borrowed a fantastic hat from Brenda, our music teacher. Jeannie’s students had a great time posing with their beards and hat.
Alphabet Group—-Letter C
We Clapped our hands to make the Crab wiggle. The sound sensitive toy was purchased from tfh Special Needs Toys.
We then played catch. We used a soft ball that was easier to grasp for our students
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The students Chose what Color ink they wanted and rolled their Cars over it. Then they proceeded to make Curves on a large brown paper grocery bag.
We opened the bag to make it a Container. We Crumpled paper (a great activity for working on palmer arches, strengthening hand intrinsics and bilateral coordination) and placed it in the bag.
We Closed the bag with Clips (we wrapped the handle of the clip with a rubber band to make it easier to open)
and……
Colorful Clothespins
to make……..
a Comfortable Cushion for our Cool Cat!!
Cara made a sound matching game. Our students had so much fun trying to match the sounds they heard on the Computer.
And finally, we Counted all the C words that we wrote on our post its!
Please join us next week for more fun Group by Group!