Our July theme was “Red Light, Green Light”… We needed to work a little on listening and following directions, so we went with a traffic rules theme. Since TJ is totally obsessed with anything involving wheels, this was a hit! We only got to see Z-Man and Sweet T a few times due to sickness, so TJ did a lot of the activities by himself. And, quite a few of the things we did were simply put out for him to play with whenever he was in the mood, so they were more than a “one time lesson.”
We started out with construction play with homemade play-doh. We made this stuff back in the winter when we did a Gingerbread Man unit, and it’s still hanging in there! There were quite a few germs floating around back then too, so we added some of Young Living’s Thieves oil to ward them off, as well as to make it smell yummy!
Counting to 3 (and recognizing the numbers) was one of our main goals for this month. TJ’s Melissa & Doug garage that he got for his birthday was perfect for practicing!
Our sensory bin was filled with black beans to look like asphalt. It made a fun plinking sound in this old agate casserole pan!
More counting practice with cars and foam shapes.
Hang onto those Melissa & Doug storage trays! They can be used for so many things!
Painting with trucks!
Drying our finished paintings.
And cleaning up is always fun if a hose is involved!
It’s even more fun with friends.
This here is serious work.
We found a fun stop light activity on Pinterest…
… Great for small motor skill coordination!
I’m playing with the idea of lap booking our themes so the little folks have something to look back on and remember…
… and maybe practice some of the things they learned!
We’ll probably add a bit more to our lapbook before we put it on the shelf, but this is what the inside looks like right now. “Red Light, Green Light” was a fun gross motor skills game we played that involved listening carefully and running about like crazy people. Our Bible verse for July was a shortened version of Ephesians 6:1, and we sang the Donut Man’s O-B-E-Y quite a bit. It was a favorite of our girls. (Or maybe of Mom and Dad’s?)
😀
Below are some favorite books that we read this month…
Anastasia Sumi’s Red Light, Green Lightis a cute rhyming picture book that showcases a little boy who used all sorts of “around the house” materials to build his roads. Discussing the pictures was fun!
Yumi Heo’s Red Light, Green Lightwas a sweet Lift-the-Flap book about road signs.
Toot Toot, Beep Beepby Emma Garciahas been a favorite since TJ was a little tyke… There are several books in this series and we love them all!
P.D. Eastman’s Go, Dog, Go!is an old favorite!
And the “sleeper” favorite was by far Red Light, Green Lightby Margaret Wise Brown. (She’s the author of Goodnight Moon!) I wasn’t sure if the quietly quirky story line and vintage illustrations would catch TJ’s attention, but he asked to read this one over and over again… sometimes right after we finished reading it!